Eric Walz

Eric Berg (2014)

Eric Walz (born March 29, 1966 in Königstein im Taunus ) is a German writer . He became known under his real name as an author of historical novels . Since 2013, Walz has been publishing crime novels under the pseudonym Eric Berg that are set in the present.

Life

Eric Walz grew up in Königstein. At the early age of 14, inspired by the life and work of the famous British writer William Somerset Maugham , he decided to write novels himself. After finishing school, he completed an apprenticeship as a retail salesman . He then worked as a commercial clerk at an insurance company , a mail order company , as well as a telecommunications and consulting company, interrupted by a short but incomplete degree in German studies , which he financed with odd jobs as a model . He also wrote short stories for newspapers and magazines. After living as a freelance personal trainer for companies and freelance writer in Berlin for a while, Walz finally decided at the age of 35 to concentrate entirely on writing.

"Only when I was able to make writing my job did I find my home port."

- Eric Berg

Works

In 2002 he published his first book, Schwule Schurken , a collection of eleven portraits of historical figures that Walz associated with homosexuality : Alexander the Great , Heliogabal , Pope Sixtus IV , Frederick the Great , Maximilien Robespierre , Alfred Redl , Ernst Röhm , J. Edgar Hoover , Yukio Mishima , Michael Kühnen and Jeffrey Dahmer . With these depictions of mostly negative figures, Walz also wanted to counterbalance the prevailing zeitgeist :

“This eternal quotation and billboarding of the model gays was no longer bearable. Gays are more beautiful, more subtle and much better in general. I just couldn't resist, I had to stir the pot a little and bring the sediment up. "

Historical novels

With his debut novel The Lady of the Popes about the Roman Pope Mother Marozia , Walz immediately had great success in 2003. His interest in historical material was also reflected in the historical novels Die Veil der Salome (2005), the story of Judean Princess Salome , and Die Sternjägerin (2006) about the astronomer Elisabetha Hevelius . With Die Glasmalerin , Walz presented a historical detective novel in 2007 , set against the backdrop of the Council of Trento . Its protagonists, the glass painter Antonia Bender and the Jesuit Sandro Carrissimi, also reappeared in The Whore of Rome . Walz published these novels with Blanvalet Verlag .

In all of his historical representations, however, Walz always values ​​poetic freedom:

"Tension, fascinating characters, a comprehensible psychology and meanwhile also a high linguistic level are more important to me than rigorous historical accuracy, which unfortunately all too often disturbs the beautiful flow of history for my taste."

In the afterwords of his novels he therefore points out which events are true and which are speculative or fictional.

Crime novels

Under the pseudonym Eric Berg , Eric Walz wrote several crime novels and youth thrillers .

The Nebelhaus was published by Limes-Verlag in 2013. The book was an immediate success and landed on the Spiegel bestseller lists at number 6.
The newspapers spoke of a successful and exciting crime thriller full of complex characters and plots. The skilful mixture of Whodunit thriller, great human drama and the partly mystical coastal landscape of Hiddensee was able to inspire readers as well as critics and even made it possible to determine some references to Hitchcock .

According to his own statements, Eric Berg was guided by several premises:

• The murderers are normal people next door without any psychological abnormalities and the acts happen through a chain of unfortunate circumstances from which the perpetrators can no longer escape. This raises moral questions, such as vigilante justice in The Shadow Bay, or how far friendship can go in The Coastal Grave.
• Tension is slowly built up through several narrated time levels and the information that is specifically scattered as a result. Sometimes the readers already know more than the main characters and sometimes it's the other way around. Patricia Highsmith and Alfred Hitchcock are role models for this . The critics described it as a "creeping up" tension.

• The focus is on the psychological dilemma, not violence. Shock elements are used sparingly towards the end, as in The Fog House the rampage towards the end of the novel.
• The suspense effect used by Berg, which is typical for Hitchcock , is then also found as a pattern in the following novels. A closed group of people is gathered around a tragedy on several time levels and the goal of the story is to solve mysteries.

The coastal grave was published again in September 2014 by Limes-Verlag.
This time a murder is committed on the Baltic Sea island of Poel , with which Eric Berg remains true to his location on a Baltic Sea island.

The media described Eric Berg's new novel as "nerve-wracking, oppressive and realistic" and speak of a successful continuation of the crime series. The coastal grave was also
able to maintain its position 10 on the Spiegel bestseller lists for several weeks.

With Die Schattenbucht Berg's third novel was published by Limes in 2016, landed on the Spiegel bestseller lists and this time took 5th place.
The setting this time is the picturesque Prerow in Darß near Western Pomerania-Rügen .

Berg's novel is compared to the dark crime novels of fellow Scandinavian writers.

All of the thrillers were also published as audio books by GoyaLIT and Random House Audio .

Youth thriller

In addition to his crime novels, Eric Berg writes on books for young people.

His thrillers Schrei (2015) and Kalt (2016) were both published by the youth book publisher Bloomoon and are characterized by a change of perspective and a gloomy mood.

Berg uses different perspectives on the one hand to conceal the perpetrator or the crime until the end. For the reader, the first-person perspective creates an almost tangible and thus authentic closeness to the young characters, their thoughts and fears.

As in his coastal crime novels, the dynamics of a group of people and the dark secrets of each play the leading role.

Eric Walz's books have now been translated into 10 countries. As of March 2017.

Cinematic adaptations

The novel The Fog House was designed by German private broadcaster Sat.1 in the spring of 2017 filmed . Directed by Claudia Garde based on the script by Sven S. Poser and Britta Stöckle.

bibliography

Non-fiction

• Gay villains. Hamburg 2002, ISBN 3-935596-04-9 .

Novels

• Lady of the Popes. Munich 2003, ISBN 3-442-36877-4 .
• The veil of Salome. Munich 2005, ISBN 3-442-36888-X .
• The star hunter. Munich 2006, ISBN 3-442-36523-6 .
• The poison master. Munich 2010, ISBN 978-3-442-37318-5 .
• The Sin Castle. Munich 2011, ISBN 978-3-442-37696-4 .

Antonia Bender trilogy

• The glass painter. Munich 2007, ISBN 978-3-442-36718-4 .
• The whore of Rome. Munich 2008, ISBN 978-3-442-36719-1 .
• The black pope. Munich 2009, ISBN 978-3-442-37269-0 .

Contributions to anthologies and community novels

• The twelfth day. Joint novel by 12 authors. Berlin 2006, ISBN 3-7466-2213-1 .
• The eighth concubine. Narrative. In: monks, assassins, minstrels. Munich 2007, ISBN 978-3-937357-22-5 .
• The third sword. Joint novel by 12 authors. Berlin 2008, ISBN 978-3-7466-2403-7 .
• Cagliostro or The Exploration of Lies. Narrative. In: The 13th Hour. Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-7466-2622-2 .

Under the pseudonym Eric Berg

• The fog house. Limes-Verlag, Munich 2013, ISBN 978-3-8090-2615-0 .
• The coastal grave. Limes-Verlag, Munich 2014, ISBN 978-3-8090-2641-9 .
• Scream. bloomoon Verlag, Munich 2015, ISBN 978-3-8458-0775-1 .
• Cold. bloomoon Verlag, Munich 2016, ISBN 978-3-8458-1231-1 .
• The shadow bay. Limes-Verlag, Munich 2016, ISBN 978-3-8090-2642-6 .
• So bitter is the vengeance. Limes-Verlag, Munich 2018, ISBN 978-3-8090-2660-0 .
• The killer island. Limes-Verlag, Munich 2020, ISBN 978-3-8090-2661-7 .

Web links

• Literature by and about Eric Walz in the catalog of the German National Library
• Ansgar Skoda: "Because that's what I want to be: a storyteller" - An interview with Eric Walz. In: Critical Edition. Online version April 8, 2006.
• Literature by and about Eric Walz in the catalog of the German National Library
• randomhouse.de
• krimi-couch.de
• histo-couch.de
• moviepilot.de

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Crime days with bestselling author Eric Berg . In: New Westphalian . March 12, 2018, p. 9 .
2. ↑ Ansgar Skoda: "Because that's what I want to be: a storyteller" - An interview with Eric Walz. In: Critical Edition. Online version April 8, 2006.
3. ↑ Ansgar Skoda: "Because that's what I want to be: a storyteller" - An interview with Eric Walz. In: Critical Edition. Online version April 8, 2006
4. ↑ Eric Walz in the questionnaire at www.historische-romane.de
5. ↑ krimi-couch.de
6. ↑ krimi-couch.de
7. ↑ moviepilot.de