The Doppelganger
William Cook

It’s February 1990, a few months since the Berlin Wall came down. Michael Braun is an Anglo-German freelance journalist, living alone in a rented room in West Berlin, scratching a living writing articles exposing old Nazis.

Bernhard Schmidt, the features editor of a Berlin newspaper, commissions Braun to write an exposé of the most notorious missing Nazi of them all. By now, nearly all the prominent Nazis have been brought to justice - or at least accounted for (Braun’s targets are invariably low-ranking nonentities). Only one big name is missing, and now Schmidt has come across a hot lead.

Braun sets off on the hunt for this man, but as he follows his trail deep into East Germany, Braun begins to wonder if there aren’t other people who’d far rather he remained hidden. With reunification negotiations at a tricky stage, the last thing the authorities need is a sensational front-page story about the unmasking of a man who personifies the darkest era in German history.

Braun soon realises he’s way out of his depth. Unlike his previous targets, this man is shrewd and ruthless. And though Braun’s objective seems virtuous, his investigation quickly becomes messy, and morally suspect. To find him, he needs to deceive and endanger decent people. Is he really doing something noble, or merely chasing cash and glory? Is his target the only doppelgänger? Or are all the players in this drama in disguise, all betraying each other?