L.M. Elliott is the author of the new young adult novel Walls, which takes place in Berlin in the early 1960s. Her many other books include the YA novel Suspect Red. A former journalist, she lives in Virginia.
Q:
What inspired you to write Walls?
A:
I was a magazine journalist for 20 years before becoming a novelist. One of the
biggest lessons I learned as a reporter was to look for “holes in
coverage”—topics that hadn’t yet been fully plumbed.
These
days, as a YA author, I spend many happy hours talking with teenagers, and a
few years back during school visits, I “spotted” such a hole. Next to no YA
books exploring how the 1950s Red Scare affected teens—despite the fact so many
high schoolers study The Crucible, Arthur Miller’s play that used the Salem
witch trials as allegory for McCarthyism.
So
I decided to write a contextualizing historical novel—a precursor to Walls—titled
Suspect Red.
During
that disturbing era, fear-mongering politicians and their oft unsubstantiated
accusations pushed Americans to turn on one another—resulting in blacklisting,
book banning, Loyalty Review Boards and oath requirements, and labeling people
as “un-American” if they challenged the status quo or advocated for change.
I
hadn’t anticipated just how relevant to recent political polarization and rhetoric
it would become.
Walls
had a similar genesis. When the former president undercut NATO, I wondered if
people remembered the frightening reasons NATO formed 72 years ago—Russia’s
brutal annexation of Eastern Europe after WWII to create a Soviet Bloc of
puppet states, and the Berlin Wall, which caged millions.
Beyond
knowing that the alliance and the Wall existed, teens and Gen Zers I asked knew
little else. I found several wonderful novels about life behind the Wall in
later years, but nothing about the tense lead up to its raising or what it was
like being American military kids stationed in a place where their dads could
be mobilized at any moment against a nuclear-armed foe.
A
hole in coverage. And what could be a more dramatic, show-rather-than-tell
story humanizing the Cold War standoff between Western democracies and
totalitarian communist regimes?
Especially
given the fact that cruel barrier was raised literally overnight after
methodical, secret plotting by East Germany and Soviet Russia.
While
spewing disinformation to convince East Berliners that Americans and NATO planned
to attack their “worker utopia” and “new just society,” East Germany quietly stockpiled
330 tons of barbed wire, concrete posts, and protective gloves. Then, following
a strict, pre-set time-tick, “Operation Rose” kicked into gear just a few
minutes past midnight on August 13, 1961.
It
was a holiday weekend and most Berliners had been joyfully preoccupied with
children’s festivals and citywide fireworks and did not notice military armed
vehicles quietly gathering on the city’s edges.
Mobilized
at the very last moment to avoid detection, thousands of GDR soldiers, paramilitary
police, and factory workers began unfurling the wire. By dawn, they had strung
up a 27-mile barricade through Berlin’s streets—splitting the city in half. East
Berliners awoke trapped. Without any warning, families, neighbors, and
sweethearts were separated—most forever.
In
Suspect Red, I wanted to give proverbial beating hearts to the Red Scare
hysteria from both sides of the debate, since communism was a real threat.
My
protagonist is the son of an idealistic FBI agent. His friend, and foil, is the
son of a State Department diplomat and a native Czechoslovakian artist,
precisely the type of liberal intellectuals McCarthy ridiculed and targeted.
It
was a creative formula that seemed to work well. So for Walls, I again created
two teens from enemy political philosophies in a divided city. This time they
are cousins—an American Army kid stationed in West Berlin and an East German
raised in the Soviet sector.
At
the novel’s opening, people can still cross back and forth within the city’s
free and Soviet sectors. The boys’ mothers want them to be friends despite all
the obstacles and the dangerous scrutiny it brings both teenagers. Soon the
cousins are embroiled in the spy-thriller-worthy intrigues that swirled around
Berlin as the Cold War’s toe-to-toe epicenter.
The
question of what it would take for that East Berlin youth—inculcated in
communist dogma, bombarded with anti-American propaganda, spied on by ardent
Freie Deutsche Jugend (“Free German Youth”) and paid neighborhood informants
—to trust a Westerner, and vice versa, felt a poignant and powerful question to
explore.
Q:
How did you create your character Drew?
A:
I so enjoyed writing Drew! Growing up in Northern Virginia, I knew many military
“brats” whose parent was doing a “Pentagon tour.” My junior high BFF was an Air
Force kid who went on to become an intelligence officer herself. And as the
daughter of a WWII veteran and 22-year reservist, I heard my dad’s peers tell
extraordinary anecdotes of their service.
So
I grew up with a deep respect both for our military and their children who follow
parents into perilous overseas postings and are uprooted constantly in service
to our country.
I
researched and built Drew by interviewing a number of “Berlin Brats,” whose fathers
were stationed in West Berlin when the Wall went up. They were incredibly
generous with their memories and time.
Drew’s
experiences and outlook—the menacing overtures and harassment of Allied
personnel and their families by the KGB and their East German minions, the
Stasi; the unnerving aura of being 100 miles behind the Soviets’ “Iron Curtain”
and surrounded by 400,000 Russian troops; the eerie anxiety of traveling in a
duty-train through the communist zone to play other high school teams; and
living in a landscape still dotted with reminders of the Nazi idealization of
“the master race”—are all haunting details these gentlemen shared.
Because
of them, I think I was able to capture (I hope convincingly!) the gutsiness of
Americans holding “an outpost of freedom,” deep within communist territory,
outnumbered 10 to 1.
Where
a teenage prank or mistake could potentially spark an international incident or
undo a parent’s military career. No joke, as those “Berlin Brats” would say
with a characteristic touch of bravado.
Q:
The Kirkus Review of the book says, "An afterword points to similarities
between the Khrushchev-led Communists’ disruptive sowing of fear and suspicion
in 1960 and Putin’s in the 2016 U.S. presidential elections." What
parallels did you hope to draw with this novel, and what do you hope readers
take away from the book?
A:
History shows that disinformation and propaganda are terrifyingly potent tools
in suppressing nations, creating mob beliefs by deadening free thought and
obliterating resistance. Look to Hitler’s Third Reich and the then Soviet Union
for example.
It
also, however, can be more subtle in its impact—seeding fear and distrust to
poison the productive conversation and sense of collaboration for a greater good
that is the engine of a democracy.
Calculated
conspiracy theories or outright lies knowingly repeated and spread, build
prejudices and unyielding tribalism that make a society vulnerable to in-fighting,
all-or-nothing thinking, scapegoating, cults of personality, and the rise of authoritarianism.
Nikita
Khrushchev, Russia’s combative leader from 1953 to 1964, famously threatened,
“We will take America without firing a shot. We do not have to invade the U.S.
We will destroy you from within.”
He
did not hide his contempt for JFK or his hatred of Nixon. He believed Kennedy
was less experienced, overly idealistic, and would be a weaker adversary.
He
bragged about manipulating our 1960 presidential election by refusing to
release captured U-2 spy plane pilot, Francis Gary Powers, during Nixon’s term
as vice president to deny him that boost in public opinion.
“As
it turns out,” Khrushchev wrote, “we’d done the right thing. Kennedy won the
election by a majority of only 200,000 votes or so, a negligible margin if you
consider the huge population of the United States. The slightest nudge either
way would have been decisive.” In his memoirs, Khrushchev claimed he told JFK,
“You know, Mr. Kennedy, we voted for you.”
Today,
Vladimir Putin, the current leader of Russia—which is credibly reported by all 17
U.S. intelligence agencies and the bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee to
have interfered in our 2016 presidential election—seems to adhere to
Khrushchev’s hopes of “picking” our leaders and that ginning up titillating
conspiracies to smear the integrity of foreign leaders will unravel a rival
society.
Putin
was well schooled in such tactics, having served as a KGB secret police officer
for 15 years. Stationed in East Germany for six of those years, Putin worked with
the infamous Stasi to monitor the thoughts and movements of its citizens,
arrest dissenters, and recruit informers to steal Western technology and NATO
military secrets.
When
Putin rose to power in 2000, Russian dissident writer Feliz Svetov said he was
a typical KGB type. “If the snow is falling,” said Svetov, “they will calmly
tell you, the sun is shining.” Spreading
lies dressed up in catchy phrasing, then perpetuating the deception with
denial, distraction, re-direct, and “what about”ism are all proven blue-smoke-and-mirrors
disinformation tactics.
There
are so many things I’d like readers to take away from this story—like enjoying
what I hope is a fast-paced and compelling narrative!
In
your question’s regard, though, I hope the narrative will inspire teens to
resolve to think for themselves, to work for what educators call “media literacy.”
To
not swallow unsubstantiated accusations or labels without doing a little
reading and thinking on their own.
To
not stubbornly hold onto opinions promulgated by their community, parents, or
peers that do not stand up to the light of fact. (Just as Drew’s cousin
Matthias had to do.)
To
listen and open up their hearts and minds to others who differ from them (like
Drew), and to accept our responsibility as a free people to not simply stand by
when witnessing others fighting for their rights—whether in a foreign nation or
marching peacefully on our own streets.
Our
country is anything but perfect. But it is formed on the most magnificent of
ideas and the promise to work toward betterment and equality for all. We have
much work left to do to achieve that.
And
that requires our voters to be informed and involved, respectful and
empathetic, in whichever party they affiliate, remembering that e pluribus unum
means: out of many, one.
I
love writing YA novels because our youth tend to listen with instinctive
compassion and curiosity—they fill me with hope.
Q:
Can you say more about how you researched this novel, and what did you learn that particularly
surprised you?
A:
As I mentioned, the “Berlin Brats” shared so many anecdotes and “revealing
details” that gifted the narrative substance and authenticity.
I
also was able to get my hands on some stunning and heart-breaking eye-witness
reporting about the night the Berlin Wall went up as well as vivid descriptions
of the city before that night of infamy—facts that often were startling in
their irony and surreal quality. (See my webpage for a bibliography of books
and film.)
Here
are some examples:
In
East Germany (the GDR), youth were encouraged and rewarded for spying on one
another. If teenagers didn’t shout the state-prescribed greeting of
“Freundschaft!” (Friendship!) with
enough exuberance, or admitted to being religious, or cut-up during a
classmate’s presentation on a Soviet martyr, or didn’t wave a flag high enough
during a parade, their “friends” might report them to school authorities,
destroying that youth’s chances of going to university.
Offenders
might also be pulled in front of a peer tribunal for questioning and a
Selbstkritik (self-criticism).
Matthias’
poignant recounting of what his supposed friends accused him of—everything from
his less-than-neat personal appearance being disrespectful of “workers’
dignity” to Kultubarbarei (spreading culture corruption) because he tuned his
radio to catch American music broadcasts from the other side of town—were all
culled from memoirs of survivors.
Despite
the dangers, East German youth so longed to hear Western music they even
managed to make pirated recordings of American jazz bands on old, discarded
X-ray film.
To
counter “degenerative” American dances like the Twist, the GDR created a state
dance called the Lipsi, an arms-length, odd mixture of waltz and rhumba movements
in 6/4-meter—which, according to GDR authorities, was pure and free from
“trash, hot music, or wiggle-hip dance.”
Rubble
from WWII bombing remained everywhere, and East German children played in
gutted lots under gargantuan photos of Khrushchev, blood-red Soviet flags, and
billboards turned toward the America zone proclaiming: “Marxism means Peace!”
During
the year leading up to August 1961 when the Wall was raised, East Germans fled in
droves. But they’d have to cross the “death zone” of Soviet sealed borders that
encircled Berlin, the city being the only escape hatch to the West still open.
They
would leave behind everything to slip through forests and bluff their way past
checkpoints. Any suitcase, any pockets bulging with belongings, might get them
pulled aside and questioned.
If
they got past those guards, they then had to fake their way across town into
Berlin’s American sector, where they could finally seek asylum in the
Marienfelde refugee camp and eventually be airlifted to the safety of West
Germany.
Most
were caught along the way, charged with Republicflucht and sent to re-education
labor camps. If they did manage to escape, family and friends who remained
behind could be imprisoned for three years in punishment for not alerting authorities.
The German film The Lives of Others opens with a chilling portrayal of a Stasi
interrogation of such a hapless friend.
1961’s
Miss Universe was actually a GDR refugee representing West Germany. An
electrical engineer, she had been well-employed and favored in the GDR’s
socialist state and had no plans of leaving—until she was threatened with jail for
not turning in her own sister and mother.
The
GDR condemned her as being seduced and prostituted by the West, a victim of
Abwerbung (Americans wooing away talented citizens) and Menschenhandel (Western
abduction, capitalist “man trade”).
On
the other side of town, American military kids faced far more dangers than I
imagined. If their fathers were intelligence officers, for instance, and they
got too close to the sector border, they were vulnerable to Stasi secret police
picking them up to hold overnight as a way of threatening, or trying to turn,
those parents.
“Berlin
Brats” had to be careful if they volunteered at Marienfelde, as Stasi double
agents posed as refugees to eavesdrop on conversations to gain useful
information about American personnel or relocated Germans for coercive blackmail.
One
Berlin alumna shared that being picked for the cheerleading squad could be
adversely affected by a girl’s prettiness. Cheerleaders traveled with the teams
to away games on the duty-trains that had to go through multiple checkpoints in
communist territory.
It
was out of concern for a girl’s safety—the worry being that a particularly
beautiful teen, through no fault of her own, might be singled out for
harassment by Soviet troops.
There’s
a lot more, but please read the book!
Q:
What are you working on now?
A:
I’ve just finished writing another WWII narrative, titled Louisa June and the
Nazis in the Waves that Katherine Tegen Books (HarperCollins) will publish in
March.
This
one’s a little different for me. I use a slightly younger, more regionalized,
first-person, and (I hope) poetic voice than I typically do for one of my
historical works. (Not unlike Ariel’s voice in Storm Dog.) Louisa June just
spoke to me that way.
I
am so grateful to Katherine, who is such a gifted and generous editor and has
nurtured me through nine novels, for letting me experiment a little with this
story and grow myself as a result.
Set
in Tidewater Virginia and the Chesapeake Bay, the historical peg is an attack
on a tugboat by a Nazi U-boat.
It’s
a little-discussed fact that immediately following Pearl Harbor, Hitler’s
submarines relentlessly attacked our merchant ships sailing along the East
Coast, averaging a sinking a night during the first six months of 1942.
Louisa June’s overarching
odyssey is learning to cope with her mama’s pervasive depression and the grief
of sudden loss—something, sadly, that many teens will be dealing with
post-COVID. I hope readers can find solace in her story and joy in the quirky,
endearing characters who help her find her way.
--Interview with Deborah Kalb. Here's a previous Q&A with L.M. Elliott.
