RIP Philip Kerr - author of the incredible 'Bernie Gunther' detective series

Yesterday I came across the sad news that author Philip Kerr (62) has passed away on Friday 23rd of March, 2018.

I can't say I am a fan of many writers. Only a few will make me read more than one book in a series. Some years ago when I was living in Berlin, Germany, I was pointed in the direction of Philip Kerr. A Scottish author that writes about a German police detective in Nazi Germany--I must admit a lot of alarm bells went off when I thought about that connection. But Kerr managed to surprise me, and after reading the trilogy containing the first three books in the 'Bernie Gunther' series he had a new loyal fan.

There are 12 books in the Bernie Gunther series. All with the same main character: the detective that makes fun of Nazis but manages to stay alive, bitter and full of sarcasm about how he his job is about having to find a murderer amidst a whole army of mass murderers. He never excuses himself for what he does, nor does he make the whole situation an easy black-and-white good-guy versus bad-guy. The humor surrounding Bernie helps. But the incredible writing and the sheer amount of research that must have gone into each book actually make it such a great series. Much more than simply a 'detective', it is philosophical, historical, funny. An incredibly strong combination that I haven't found in any other detective series, and trust me, I've looked.

But Philip Kerr also wrote other books. Non-fiction, children books. And novels unrelated to the Bernie Gunther series. Some also detective based, like 'Philosophical Investigations' which I would truly recommend to people as it is such a original and almost satirical take on the 'detective' as a genre. And also the book 'Research' I would definitely recommend, it proposes a new way of looking at writing best-sellers and this book truly changed the way I have thought about everything the Kerr has written.

He was a mater story teller, making you reconsider what you thought was normal.
And most of all, he makes me walk through Berlin the way I experienced Berlin, his descriptions are very accurate and they show a deep love and obsession with that city and its history, that I share.

I am very sad I will not have another Kerr to read, and this makes it even more bitter to have just finished the latest Bernie Gunther novel some weeks ago.

Sources used:
Article in the Guardian "Philip Kerr, author of Bernie Gunther novels, dies aged 62", March 24, 2018 (link here).

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