
"Promise Me You'll Shoot Yourself"
The Mass Suicide of Ordinary Germans in 1945
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Narrated by:
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Sam Peter Jackson
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By:
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Florian Huber
About this listen
Named a Best History Book of 2019 by The Times (UK)
The astounding true story of how thousands of ordinary Germans, overcome by shame, guilt, and fear, killed themselves after the fall of the Third Reich and the end of World War II.
By the end of April 1945 in Germany, the Third Reich had fallen and invasion was underway. As the Red Army advanced, horrifying stories spread about the depravity of its soldiers. For many German people, there seemed to be nothing left but disgrace and despair. For tens of thousands of them, the only option was to choose death - for themselves and for their children.
"Promise Me You'll Shoot Yourself" recounts this little-known mass event. Using diaries, letters, and memoirs, historian Florian Huber traces the euphoria of many ordinary Germans as Hitler restored national pride; their indifference as the Führer's political enemies, Jews, and other minorities began to suffer; and the descent into despair as the war took its terrible toll, especially after the invasion of the Soviet Union. Above all, he investigates how suicide became a contagious epidemic as the country collapsed.
Drawing on eyewitness accounts and other primary sources, "Promise Me You'll Shoot Yourself" presents a riveting portrait of a nation in crisis, and sheds light on a dramatic yet largely unknown episode of postwar Germany.
©2020 Florian Huber (P)2020 Little, Brown SparkListeners also enjoyed...
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Critic reviews
"Gripping ... Huber tells the shocking stories of ordinary German suicides with literary power and skill, making excellent use of unknown material." (Richard Evans, The Guardian)
"Vivid and disturbing...Though the topic is relentlessly grim, Huber portrays his subjects with empathy and offers key insights into the German mindset before, during, and after WWII. Readers will be convinced that reckoning with the war's legacy requires studying this underexamined tragedy." (Publishers Weekly)
"A remarkable book -- grim and fascinating. Florian Huber tells the story well." (Robbie Millen, The Times)
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Interesting story bogged down by monotony of tone and pacing
- By brian on 10-16-23
By: Janet Wallach
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Mirrors in the Earth
- Reflections on Self-Healing from the Living World
- By: Asia Suler
- Narrated by: Asia Suler
- Length: 9 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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A nature therapy session for the soul—encounter the benevolence of the living world through 12 essays on the Earth-healing powers of self-compassion and empathy.
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amazing feel good book!
- By April on 04-01-25
By: Asia Suler
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Orwell's Roses
- By: Rebecca Solnit
- Narrated by: Rebecca Solnit
- Length: 7 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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“In the spring of 1936, a writer planted roses.” So begins Rebecca Solnit’s new book, a reflection on George Orwell’s passionate gardening and the way that his involvement with plants, particularly flowers, illuminates his other commitments as a writer and antifascist, and on the intertwined politics of nature and power. Sparked by her unexpected encounter with the roses he reportedly planted in 1936, Solnit’s account of this overlooked aspect of Orwell’s life journeys through his writing and his actions.
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Absolutely Awful!
- By asdf on 04-06-22
By: Rebecca Solnit
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Life's Edge
- The Search for What It Means to Be Alive
- By: Carl Zimmer
- Narrated by: Joe Ochman
- Length: 9 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Carl Zimmer investigates one of the biggest questions of all: What is life? The answer seems obvious until you try to seriously answer it. Is the apple sitting on your kitchen counter alive, or is only the apple tree it came from deserving of the word? If we can’t answer that question here on Earth, how will we know when and if we discover alien life on other worlds? The question hangs over some of society’s most charged conflicts - whether a fertilized egg is a living person, for example, and when we ought to declare a person legally dead.
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What is Life?
- By Shane S Shull on 04-29-21
By: Carl Zimmer
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Super Fly
- The Unexpected Lives of the World's Most Successful Insects
- By: Jonathan Balcombe
- Narrated by: Jonathan Balcombe
- Length: 8 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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For most of us, the only thing we know about flies is that they're annoying, and our usual reaction is to try to kill them. In Super Fly, the myth-busting biologist Jonathan Balcombe shows the order Diptera in all of its diversity, illustrating the essential role that flies play in every ecosystem in the world as pollinators, waste-disposers, predators, and food source; and how flies continue to reshape our understanding of evolution.
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Wonderful
- By Chris on 02-13-22
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Fundamentals
- Ten Keys to Reality
- By: Frank Wilczek
- Narrated by: Sean Patrick Hopkins, Frank Wilczek
- Length: 7 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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One of our great contemporary scientists reveals the 10 profound insights that illuminate what everyone should know about the physical world.
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Is this for kindergarteners?
- By James S. on 01-24-21
By: Frank Wilczek
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Masala Lab
- The Science of Indian Cooking
- By: Krish Ashok
- Narrated by: Ashish Bhandari
- Length: 7 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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Masala Lab by Krish Ashok is a science nerd's exploration of Indian cooking with the ultimate aim of making the listener a better cook and turning the kitchen into a joyful, creative playground for culinary experimentation. Just like memorizing an equation might have helped you pass an exam but not become a chemist, following a recipe without knowing its rationale can be a sub-optimal way of learning how to cook.
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Learned a lot!
- By Sharon S. Dorondo on 12-21-22
By: Krish Ashok
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Power Metal
- The Race for the Resources That Will Shape the Future
- By: Vince Beiser
- Narrated by: Vince Beiser
- Length: 7 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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Vince Beiser explores the Achilles’ heel of “green power” and digital technology–that manufacturing computers, cell phones, electric cars, and other technologies demand skyrocketing amounts of lithium, copper, cobalt, and other materials. Around the world, businesses and governments are scrambling for new places and new ways to get those metals, at enormous cost to people and the planet. Beiser crisscrossed the world to talk to the people involved and report on the damage this race is inflicting, the ways it could get worse, and how we can minimize the damage.
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Misleading title
- By O. D. S on 11-21-24
By: Vince Beiser
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To Boldly Grow
- Finding Joy, Adventure, and Dinner in Your Own Backyard
- By: Tamar Haspel
- Narrated by: Tamar Haspel
- Length: 7 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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Journalist and self-proclaimed “crappy gardener” Tamar Haspel is on a mission: to show us that raising or gathering our own food is not as hard as it’s often made out to be. When she and her husband move from Manhattan to two acres on Cape Cod, they decide to adopt a more active approach to their diet: raising chickens, growing tomatoes, even foraging for mushrooms and hunting their own meat. They have more ambition than practical know-how, but that’s not about to stop them from trying…even if sometimes their reach exceeds their (often muddy) grasp.
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Funny, Smart, and Growth Encouraging
- By CLF on 03-28-23
By: Tamar Haspel
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Move Like Water
- My Story of the Sea
- By: Hannah Stowe
- Narrated by: Anna Rust
- Length: 6 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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As a young girl, Hannah Stowe was raised at the tide’s edge on the Pembrokeshire coast of Wales, falling asleep to the sweep of the lighthouse beam. Now in her midtwenties, working as a marine biologist and sailor, Stowe draws on her professional experiences sailing tens of thousands of miles in the North Sea, North Atlantic, Mediterranean, Celtic Sea, and the Caribbean to explore the human relationship with wild waters. Why is it, she asks, that she and so many others have been drawn to life at sea—and what might the water around us be able to teach us?
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Every sentence is so beautiful
- By Raleigh on 11-16-23
By: Hannah Stowe
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You Look Like a Thing and I Love You
- How Artificial Intelligence Works and Why It's Making the World a Weirder Place
- By: Janelle Shane
- Narrated by: Xe Sands
- Length: 5 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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"You look like a thing and I love you" is one of the best pickup lines ever...according to an artificial intelligence trained by scientist Janelle Shane, creator of the popular blog AI Weirdness. She creates silly AIs that learn how to name paint colors, create the best recipes, and even flirt (badly) with humans — all to understand the technology that governs so much of our daily lives.
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Funny and smart, but biased on bias
- By Razter on 11-11-19
By: Janelle Shane
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The Braindead Megaphone
- By: George Saunders
- Narrated by: George Saunders
- Length: 6 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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George Saunders's first foray into nonfiction is comprised of essays on literature, travel, and politics. At the core of this unique collection are Saunders's travel essays based on his trips to seek out the mysteries of the "Buddha Boy" of Nepal; to attempt to indulge in the extravagant pleasures of Dubai; and to join the exploits of the minutemen at the Mexican border. Saunders expertly navigates the works of Mark Twain, Kurt Vonnegut, and Esther Forbes, and leads the listener across the rocky political landscape of modern America.
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George Saunders is a genius!
- By caitlyngarofolo on 05-31-20
By: George Saunders
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Doctor Dealer
- A Doctor High on Greed, a Biker Gang High on Opioids, and the Woman Who Paid the Ultimate Price
- By: George Anastasia, Ralph Cipriano
- Narrated by: Jim Frangione
- Length: 7 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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Dr. James Kauffman and his wife, April, were the perfect couple: a respected endocrinologist and a beautiful radio host. But under the surface lurked a world of drugs, sex, and biker gangs. A world Dr. Kauffman would kill to keep secret.
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A WORLD OF SLEAZE AND MANIPULATION
- By AJC on 10-19-20
By: George Anastasia, and others
Treasure trove of perspective
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Insight on human capitulation and dispair
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Harrowing and Enlightening Book with Terrific Narration!!
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This book should be required reading for anyone that seeks to understand how ordinary people could be transformed into monsters.
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Nothing is held back and leaves you with few questions about the mindset of the German people during the last weeks of the war.
Eye opener
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I’ve read countless books about World War II, but "Promise Me You'll Shoot Yourself" offered an outlook I had never considered—the aftermath in Germany and the fate of its people post-war. This book sheds light on a harrowing and little-known aspect of history: the mass suicides of ordinary Germans after their defeat.
What struck me was the desperation and confusion among those who never planned for defeat. The young teens, brainwashed by Nazi propaganda, found themselves lost and unable to cope without the rigid discipline they once knew, leading them to tragic ends.
The book also delves into the guilt and horror felt by civilians who had ignored the whispers of atrocities, only to face the harsh reality and choose death over living with the truth. The fear of the advancing Red Army and the atrocities that accompanied their arrival pushed many to take their own lives and those of their families, including children and infants.
The scale of the suicides is staggering and heart-wrenching. Tens of thousands took their lives for various reasons, all tied to the devastating impact of war. This book is an eye-opener, presenting a horrifying and complex picture of why so many felt their only option was suicide.
Overall, "Promise Me You'll Shoot Yourself" is a gripping and thought-provoking read. It's horrifying to consider all the different reasons behind these tragic decisions, but it’s essential for understanding the full scope of WWII's impact.
⭐⭐⭐⭐
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