This is the journal of Ignatz Himmelsputz, survivor, dwarf and entertainer. It is 1974 and Ignatz lives in Frankfurt with Giselle, who is the singer in his band, his teacher and a trans survivor of the Vietnam War.

A chance meeting with Hermann, the son of Von Bühler, an SS Officer under whose control he was kept in the Nazi period, triggers in Ignatz a desire to get his story down: how he was ordered to be the companion to Von Bühler’s sister who had Down’s Syndrome and how he witnessed the sister’s descent into the hell of the Nazi euthanasia programmes. He writes down his story interspersed with the detail of his struggles in helping Giselle to cope with her own past. He befriends Hermann and finally reconnects with the man who caused him so much suffering and is now a successful Child Psychologist. Together they are forced to confront their pasts… 

This compelling story of man’s inhumanity to man and the liberating elation of forgiveness is a worthy parable for the twenty-first century.

Listen below to the music that inspired Giselle and Mr Memphis, with songs that the author was listening to in Frankfurt in 1974, some of which feature in the novel.