You Can Hear Chopin from the Attic: 5 Things You Need to Know

In this new course of planning and development, a lot has changed to this wartime thriller. But there are five things that are set in stone…

You Can Hear Chopin from the Attic is my latest major project, as you well know. Currently very much in the beginning stages of work-in-progress. Behind-the-scenes, I have been doing a lot of research into 1940s Berlin, trying to find the little there is to find about the way hotels and high society ran at the time. And through all that research, a lot of things have changed about the story and the characters. For the better, I hope…

However, there are five things that are staying put. And I have listed them below:

1. IT IS SET IN BERLIN, 1943

One of the unique points of this story is its premise. Chronicling events in a luxury hotel right in the middle of World War II. A time where the German capital was at the mercy of the Allies’ bombs.

2. CENTRED AROUND TWO MAIN CHARACTERS

Readers of my Berylford Scandals series will know I like to feature a lot of characters. And a lot of concurrent, interweaving storylines. I have dialled that back a bit with this project. Instead, we follow two main characters. Heinrich, who is the owner of the hotel where most of the action is set. And Cordelia, a guest in that hotel, who has a hidden agenda.

3. THE STORY IS NOT ABOUT CLASSICAL MUSIC

Frédéric Chopin’s name may be in the title, and his music may have a role in the plot… indeed, a piece of his music was the catalyst for the whole damn thing! But this story does not concern a concert pianist or anything like that. We’re not novelising a Roman Polanski film. So don’t be misled by the title, if classical music isn’t your thing.

4. THERE IS A MENTAL HEALTH THEME

I struggled to find stories set in Nazi Germany that focused on the NSDAP’s persecution of the mentally ill. So this is one of the predominant themes in this book.

5. THERE WILL BE HUMOUR

As with any story set in Nazi Germany, or by extension World War II in general, You Can Hear Chopin is set to be a very heavy story. It’ll need some funny moments to balance it out. And as such, drawing on ten years’ experience in the hospitality industry, as well as observations in and around it, I intend to make this novel something of a satire. More specifically satirising people’s attitudes towards the hotel trade and its workers.

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