"Every word here feels set down with care and fierce conscience. The resulting narrative glows." - San Francisco Chronicle
A novel of rich details and landscapes, Winter Kept Us Warm follows three friends through six decades - from postwar Berlin to Manhattan, 1960s Los Angeles to contemporary Morocco. A twisting narrative reveals their mysteries in fragments, examining their long-ago love triangle and how it changed their lives forever.
"This novel is a profound success that manages to take its place in the canon of excellent war literature while also maintaining a kind of magical surreality . . . This is an astonishing read, a best-of, and a masterful treatise on enduring." - Lambda Literary
Genre: Literary Fiction
A novel of rich details and landscapes, Winter Kept Us Warm follows three friends through six decades - from postwar Berlin to Manhattan, 1960s Los Angeles to contemporary Morocco. A twisting narrative reveals their mysteries in fragments, examining their long-ago love triangle and how it changed their lives forever.
"This novel is a profound success that manages to take its place in the canon of excellent war literature while also maintaining a kind of magical surreality . . . This is an astonishing read, a best-of, and a masterful treatise on enduring." - Lambda Literary
Genre: Literary Fiction
Praise for this book
"Anne Raeff's extraordinary novel fills me with wonder: at the vivid textures of the different worlds she describes, whether it is a Moroccan wedding or a wintry Berlin apartment, at the complex emotional landscapes of her three main characters, and at the humanity and wisdom in her story. Through the flawed, deep love shared by Leo, Isaac, and Ulli, we learn of the pain of loss, the consolations of friendship, and the enduring, traumatic legacies of war. A haunting, indispensable novel." - Sylvia Brownrigg
"A tale of an unusual love triangle spanning decades, Anne Raeff's Winter Kept Us Warm explores how war builds loyalties and tears them apart, how secrets destroy the best in us, and how a single lifetime isn't enough to make up for all we have lost. Beguiling, mesmerizing, touching, and smart, this novel will lure you back to page one to experience it all over again." - Michelle Hoover
"From the first night that Ulli, Leo, and Isaac meet, in a bar in Berlin the winter after the war, the reader is absorbed in their history and their fate. Raeff writes with vivid assurance about Berlin, America, and Morocco, about men and women, about love and work. As the boundaries between characters shift, as past and present converge, Winter Kept Us Warm casts a dazzling spell. A wonderful novel." - Margot Livesey
"I loved this book. It's a book about history, about the world, about love and responsibility and being true - to others and to yourself - but like all good books it's really just about us, people, how hard it is to live, and how much joy there is in trying to. An astonishing and impressive book that illuminates and particularizes the twentieth century." - Daniel Wallace
"A tale of an unusual love triangle spanning decades, Anne Raeff's Winter Kept Us Warm explores how war builds loyalties and tears them apart, how secrets destroy the best in us, and how a single lifetime isn't enough to make up for all we have lost. Beguiling, mesmerizing, touching, and smart, this novel will lure you back to page one to experience it all over again." - Michelle Hoover
"From the first night that Ulli, Leo, and Isaac meet, in a bar in Berlin the winter after the war, the reader is absorbed in their history and their fate. Raeff writes with vivid assurance about Berlin, America, and Morocco, about men and women, about love and work. As the boundaries between characters shift, as past and present converge, Winter Kept Us Warm casts a dazzling spell. A wonderful novel." - Margot Livesey
"I loved this book. It's a book about history, about the world, about love and responsibility and being true - to others and to yourself - but like all good books it's really just about us, people, how hard it is to live, and how much joy there is in trying to. An astonishing and impressive book that illuminates and particularizes the twentieth century." - Daniel Wallace
Used availability for Anne Raeff's Winter Kept Us Warm