Publishers Weekly
★ 05/18/2020
In this enrapturing debut, Hofmann constructs a beguiling tale of espionage, moral responsibility and the “spooky action” of quantum mechanics. Taking place in 1989 East Berlin before the fall of the wall, the story is structured around a series of entanglements and disappearances. Bernd Zeiger made his name in the secret police by writing a “demoralization” manual detailing how to sow confusion, extract confessions, and “put an entire nation, a world, to sleep.” In the 1960s, Zeiger spied on and elicited the confession of his neighbor Johannes Held, a quantum physicist withholding information about a secret American experiment in teleportation he’d gleaned while on a fellowship in the Arizona desert. In 1989, Zeiger tells Held’s story, and his role in it, to Lara, a young waitress to whom Zeiger is particularly drawn. The guilt-ridden and ailing Zeiger wants to offer Lara “coherence, linkages, the sequence of things”—in other words, the “perfect confession.” Shortly thereafter, Lara herself vanishes, and Zeiger sets about trying to locate her. The plot grows intricate but never convoluted as the connections between Zeiger, Held, and Lara gradually come into focus. In portraying two equally head-scratching phenomena—paranormal vanishings and the absurd, sinister workings of a totalitarian state—the novel hovers between genres like a subatomic particle between states. All the more impressive, Hoffman’s exceptional debut never loses sight of the desires, mysteries, and small acts of rebellion that persist within dehumanizing systems. (Aug.)
From the Publisher
A story that John le Carré might have written for ‘The Twilight Zone,’ the tale of a spy who comes in from the cold while his world turns inside out… It’s not easy to make such a bureaucratic monster sympathetic, but by plumbing Zeiger’s existential crisis, Hofmann manages to reach his essential humanity… A rare novel that encourages you to read as though your sanity depends on it.”—Ron Charles, Washington Post
“A gripping debut novel… Hofmann portrays [a] pervasive sense of syncope through rhythmic prose and powerful allusions to faith in an amoral world… she also establishes an effective tension between the German penchant for order and the sudden eruptions of chaos… Hofmann heightens this sense of entropy with evocative descriptions of people and places… [a sense of capsizing] reaches a pinnacle at the novel’s clever, dramatic end.”—Dalia Sofer, New York Times Book Review
“Expertly crafted… I loved every… unpredictable minute of it.” —Arianna Rebolini, BuzzFeed
“Nothing is as it appears and nobody is to be trusted . . . A clever and constantly surprising novel.”—Kate Saunders, The Times
"Enrapturing... Hofmann constructs a beguiling tale of espionage... the novel hovers between genres like a subatomic particle between states. All the more impressive, Hoffman's exceptional debut never loses sight of the desires, mysteries, and small acts of rebellion that persist within dehumanizing systems."—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"A remarkable first novel that reads like the work of a seasoned pro... Hofmann writes in assured prose of carefully chosen details that mark the best period fiction... she conjures up dark comedy in an understated, quirky satire of the Stasi's bureaucracy and cruelty and the paranoia that permeated East Germany."—Kirkus (starred review)
"Gorgeous, dark, and haunted... a masterpiece of restraint, insight, and style... There is an extraordinary clarity of perception in these pages and one is astonished time and again at Jennifer Hofmann's prodigious gifts... It is a singular feat for a book about subject matter this chilling to make the reader feel so deeply; and yet that is part of the work of timeless literature, which is what this incandescent novel surely will come to be regarded as."—Matthew Thomas, New York Times bestselling author of We Are Not Ourselves
"A beautiful and haunting novel that will linger in the minds of its readers... The Standardization of Demoralization Procedures challenges the reader to separate the fantastical from the merely bizarre. Is it the state or its citizens who are losing their minds? And how much repression can the human heart and soul withstand?"—David Bezmozgis, author of the National Jewish Book Award winner The Betrayers
"A masterful waltz... an endlessly captivating puzzle... Despite the seemingly doomed world in which the novel takes place, Hofmann manages to dazzle us with brilliant humor, unrivaled insight, and fragments of hope. She recalls the prose brilliance of Jenny Erpenbeck, the philosophical curiosity of Milan Kundera, and the passion for the charming and the odd of Haruki Murakami... The Standardization of Demoralization Procedures is a hilarious, humanist, gorgeously written treatise on the currents that stir the human soul under the direst circumstances... I read this book in almost a single breath, and it is easily the best novel I've encountered this year, brilliant and funny and profound, producing some of the most complex, fascinating characters I've ever known... an instant classic."—Jaroslav Kalfar, author of Spaceman of Bohemia, finalist for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize, the Arthur C. Clarke Award, and the Dayton Literary Peace Prize
“Despite nourish trappings and some clever plot reversals, Hofmann’s novel is noteworthy not for its riff on the espionage-thriller genre, but for using a surreal historical moment to explore broader points about the collapse of ideals and the corrosiveness of secrecy.”—Brendan Driscoll, Booklist
Kirkus Reviews
★ 2020-06-03
In 1989, an older Stasi operative in East Berlin ponders the disappearance of a young woman and recalls a torture victim in this fine debut.
Bernd Zeiger boosted his early career with the East German secret service in the 1960s by writing a manual on how to demoralize those suspected of veering from the party line. Now he is 60 and has been shunted aside to minor surveillance duties. His days usually proceed according to a regular schedule and predictable meals (the German word Zeiger can refer to the hand of a clock). But during much of the novel’s single day he’s preoccupied with Lara, a young waitress at his local cafe who vanished a month ago, and a physicist named Johannes Held, whom Stasi operatives tortured years earlier after he returned from a fellowship to Arizona. Hofmann, who was born in the U.S. but grew up in Germany, writes in assured prose of carefully chosen details that mark the best period fiction. It can be a while before it’s clear that this is not a Cold War spy thriller. As Zeiger’s day proceeds, interrupted by long flashbacks, Hofmann conjures up dark comedy in an understated, quirky satire of the Stasi’s bureaucracy and cruelty and the paranoia that permeated East Germany. It’s more smiles than George Smileys, but the author also finds tension in mysteries other than a lady vanishing: Why do boys go missing in the Arizona desert? Were the Americans working on teleportation? Why is his blind, womanizing neighbor visiting the same Meissen shop as Zeiger when he buys a porcelain dog for Lara? At the end of this day in 1989, Zeiger and his ilk are left to contemplate the biggest disappearance ever in a city with a wall built to prevent departures.
A remarkable first novel that reads like the work of a seasoned pro.
