Address Unknown

I read about Address Unknown by (Katherine) Kressmann Taylor on Renee's Reading Group. Wow! What a powerful little novel. At under 60 pages, I'd consider it more of a novella. But wow! The edition I read had an introduction by a teacher who had lived through World War II and an by Kressmann Taylor's son, Charles Douglas Taylor. Both enriched the story quite a bit.

Address Unknown is an epistolary novel with the letters being written by two men who, at the start of the novel, are partners in an art gallery in San Francisco. Max is a Jew who remains in San Francisco and Martin is a German (non-Jew) who returns to Germany in 1932, just as Hitler is coming to power. It portrays the insidious spread of Nazism and how that destroys what was a strong friendship.

From Goodreads:

Originally published in Story magazine in 1938, Address Unknown became an international sensation. Credited with exposing the dangers of Nazism to American readers early on, it is also a scathing indictment of fascist movements around the world and a harrowing exposé of the power of the pen as a weapon. A powerful and eloquent tale about the consequences of a friendship - and society - poisoned by extremism, Address Unknown remains hauntingly and painfully relevant today.