The most recommended books about Austria

There are many different vantage points from which to view the road to war in 1914, but an essential one is that which focuses on the ethos, politics, and strategy of one of the constellations of European Great Powers. In the 1980s, Macmillan published a series of books focusing on each of these, written by acknowledged experts (Zara Steiner on Britain, John Keiger on France, Dominic Lieven on Russia, Volker Berghahn on Germany, Richard Bosworth on Italy). The last in the series appeared in 1990, when Samuel Williamson published his study of Austria-Hungary.

It was well worth the wait. Comprehensive in its structure, balanced in its judgments, meticulous in its research, Williamson established a new standard for studies of the Great Powers. His conclusion – that Austria-Hungary was largely responsible for initiating the July Crisis and, ultimately, the war itself – is persuasively argued and the story compellingly told.

Royal history centres around marriages, but one thing that rarely happened in the 19th century was intermarriage between Protestant and Catholic houses. 

In an effort to find out about the families that  Victoria’s descendants didn’t marry into, I read this book and came across the Habsburg dynasty and a European icon - Empress Elizabeth. Known as Sisi, Elizabeth was a stunning beauty who captivated the Emperor of Austria. He was supposed to be marrying her sister. The poor sister was dropped, Sisi and the Emperor married and lived not very happily ever after. She hated being an Empress and became an eccentric recluse.

There are lots of books about Sisi, many painting her a tragic heroine, and some as a selfish egomaniac. Haslip doesn’t judge, she just states the facts in a very readable way, allowing you to form your own opinion.

Do read this before watching the Romy Schneider… show more.

This is a heartbreaking, yet uplifting novel of love and survival inspired by real resistance workers during World War II Austria, and the mysterious love letter that connects generations of Jewish families. It takes place in both 1989 Los Angeles and 1938 Austria. I love this book because of Jillian’s beautiful writing, and her strong sense of place. I felt transported to WWII Austria, where I became deeply invested in the love story between Kristoff and Elena. I also enjoyed that the modern-day story takes place pre-internet, where a newly divorced woman, Katie, does hands-on research to learn more about an unusual WWII-era stamp. Both narratives weave together seamlessly. I was lucky to read this book while visiting my family in Switzerland, surrounded by the beauty of the Alps.

Helen McInnes books made their way into my family via those Readers Digest Condensed books that used to come in the mail. They were hard bound and heavy to hold, but it was fun to open them and explore new books. The only one I remember, though, is one by Helen McInnes. I had to go find the complete book because when they condense? You miss a lot. I recommend starting with her first book, Above Suspicion. I loved her characters right off. This isn’t one of those stories that starts with a big bang. The tension rises very slowly and you don’t realize you are being wound up like a spring until it’s too late to put it down. And cool factoid, the author was in the OAS in World War II. She knew her stuff. 

Manhattan art dealer Sera James watched her world crumble at the altar two years ago, and her heart is still fragile. Her desire for distraction reignites a passion for a mysterious portrait she first saw as a young girl—a painting of a young violinist with piercing blue eyes. Along with wealthy heir William Hanover, Sera unravels the story behind the painting’s subject, an Austrian violinist Adele Von Bron who smuggles Jews out of Vienna and finds herself in Auschwitz.

Evocative, haunting, soul searching, this debut by Cambron is time-slip historical fiction at its best: heartbreaking truth of the horrors of Auschwitz, romance with a musical refrain, art and faith. Just the kind of story I try to write. A delight.

Gödel (1906-1978) is, like Newton, an unpromising subject for biography. He was antisocial and mentally unstable. His obsessive fear of being poisoned led eventually to him starving himself to death. 

Rebecca Goldstein is a professor of philosophy with a deep interest in logic and the foundations of mathematical truth – the applecart that Gödel overturned in 1931 with his tremendous paper on the incompleteness of axiomatic systems. She is also an experienced novelist. This combination makes her just the right person to construct a gripping story out of Gödel’s weirdness and world-shaking importance.

This novel, first published in 1963, looks at how we create meaning in our lives through the investment and care we give to that life. A woman vacationing in the Austrian mountains is suddenly cut off from the rest of humanity by a mysterious cataclysmic event, of which she may be the sole human survivor.

As a firsthand account, it examines her fear, loneliness, and ultimate commitment to creating a meaningful life in her new reality. It can be seen as a critique of modern life and how it has cut us off from the rhythms of nature. It is also a feminist novel depicting a woman’s devotion to making and nurturing a life.

Ultimately, it examines how we create value and purpose through our choices and actions.

Josef Roth is now recognized as one of the greatest German writers of the twentieth century. As a historian myself, I was entranced by reading it by the way in which the book catches the vast temporal arc of the transformation and then fall of a society that had for centuries been a major force in European history, the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Now forgotten, this was the world of Vienna’s great resplendence, then fall.

The story is told through the generational story of one family, the von Trottas. Impending loss is conveyed alongside great affection as a whole world is lost in the disasters of the First World War. The book was first published in English in 1933. In the words of another of Josef Roth’s books, “I was there,” which he was.

The second in the Liebermann Papers: a mystery series featuring Freud-student Max Liebermann noted as literature’s first psychoanalytic detective who helps the pragmatic and gruff Detective Inspector Oskar Rheinhardt solve some of fin-de-siecle Vienna’s most dastardly crimes. While since made into a successful PBS series, the book’s atmospheric rendering of the Baroque jewel’s opulence is countered by the stark portrayals of anti-semitism, paranoia, and the primitive, cruel, and rudimentary techniques used to “treat” patients suffering from mental disorders.  

Also a book written by an insider. Langbein was an Austrian communist who was arrested by the Nazis in Vienna and got deported.

He became a Funktionshäftling in the camp (a prisoner who had to help the Nazis with daily tasks) and wrote this formidable book about Auschwitz right after the war. Langbein describes in great detail and with style about the daily life, including sports and music, in Auschwitz I.

Non-judgemental and seemingly without anger. That’s why this book is so impressive.