The Stasi Game, by David Young – book review

Damn, it looks like my idea for a police procedural set in the communist bloc wasn’t so original after all.

I guess 1982 DDR is a more doable and relatable setting. Of course, some of us actually remember the 1980s – Erich Honecher overseeing a procession of tanks on the TV or Heike Drechsler winning Olympic medals – and it’s been fetishised in programmes like Stranger Things.

East Germany was also the most wealthy communist state, and in that regard the most western. There must be a lot to explore in the tension between relative affluence and style and a truly horrendous state apparatus where a good proportion of the population are spying on each other.