Through the eyes of young civilians

Rust and Bone
by Dietrich Kalteis

Toronto: ECW Press, 2026
$24.95 / 9781770418509

Reviewed by Bill Paul

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Taking place in 1945 during the freezing-cold final months of World War Two, the novel Rust and Bone follows the daily struggles of two innocent victims of war, Jakob Fritsch and Frida Beckmann. Jakob and Frida and their families endure food shortages, starvation, and round-the-clock bombings that destroy homes and villages. The two are brave, bright teenagers, loyal to their families, and coping with the uncertainty and chaos of war. As he did in his novel, Nobody from Somewhere, North Vancouver author Dietrich Kalteis brings together two survivors who hope to start a new life for themselves in a postwar world.

The setting is war-torn Ukraine, Poland, and Germany. Armed conflict between Germany and the Soviet Union and Allied aerial bombardment has caused the destruction of towns and cities, the disruption of transportation systems, and the separation of families. Civilians, prisoners of war, Jews, ethnic Germans, and other ‘undesirables’ have been forced into labour and concentration camps (death by work). Millions of people have died from malnourishment, disease, and torture. The author has described Rust and Bone as a story that honours those who suffered and made it through the war. For this reader, the novel is part fast-paced young adult fiction and part historical tale of twentieth-century warfare.

Jakob is the son of a German family whose farm goes back three generations. He lives with his family in Salistal, a village in the Ukraine, and grew up hearing stories about the Holodomor, a famine initiated by the Soviet government under Stalin that killed millions of Ukrainian peasants in 1932-1933. One morning Russian soldiers overrun and destroy Salistal and force the men onto freight cars. But before the train can reach a labour camp, it’s bombed by the Luftwaffe. The train topples over, “splintered wood and dead bodies.” Many of the prisoners, including Jakob, pour out of the train and scatter. Standing in the knee-high snow, Jakob recognizes two men from the village, the postmaster, Stefan Holt. and Schoolmaster Schaefer, an apologist for the Nazi party’s racist theories.

The two men and Jakob head west. They trek through forests and frozen fields and follow dirt roads through Ukraine and Poland. Fighting the cold weather and hunger, exhausted and sleeping standing up under a canopy of trees or sheltering in abandoned churches, the men survive on wild plants and handouts from Red Cross workers. Lines of refugees are fleeing for their safety, their “bodies pressed shoulder to shoulder.” Jakob, Stefan, and Schaefer encounter corpses and deserters and a landscape made up of bomb-scarred trees and landmines planted by the retreating Wehrmacht to impede Russian soldiers. With a bit of luck and grit, Jakob hopes to make his way to Berlin and surrender to American soldiers.

Over a thousand kilometres to the west, sixteen year-old Frida Beckmann and her mother, grandfather (Opa), and younger sister and brother live in a small village near Berlin. Frida’s father, Ernst, is an American prisoner of war. In the past the family owned some farmland. Now Frida’s family survives on rations and takes shelter each night in the family’s bunker, living with “thoughts of the world above being wiped away.” Frida and her best friend Liesel share memories about former classmates. Young men who have had “a half day training with a rifle” and who are now part of the Hitler Youth fighting for their homeland. In Germany, fighting for the homeland is considered “the ultimate sacrifice.” For some in the country, patriotism remains strong.

But Frida and her family have stopped believing in the “propaganda machine” of the Nazi Party. The stories they’ve read in Das Reich and heard on state radio about their country’s victories on the battlefield are nothing but lies. What Frida’s mother calls “fairy tales.” By this time, German towns are in ruins from the Allied bombing offensive. Soviet tank crews and artillery are advancing towards Berlin and, street by street, Soviet soldiers are fighting with German defenders. Crowds of people from the cities and the countryside are leaving with a few possessions, and flee on bicycles and horse-drawn carts. Some take their livestock with them.

Rust and Bone is an action novel, and as Kalteis did in his previous crime novels, he blends “history with moments of pure fiction.” In fact, the current novel is a change of pace for a writer who mostly writes crime fiction and is known for an award-winning crime novel (Under an Outlaw Moon) from 2021. 

In Rust and Bone, the destruction of the village of Salistal at the beginning of the book sets up the continuous action that carries the story forward. In this scene a Motorrad (a motorcycle equipped with a sidecar) carrying three members of the Schutzstaffel (commonly known as the SS) arrive unannounced at the Beckmann house. Apparently the officers have information that Frida’s grandfather, Opa, may be a traitor—

The Untersturmfuhrer (Second Lieutenant) came in next. The SS man from the motorcycle banged in after, then came another soldier, neither wiping their boots. Rifles on their shoulders, they bumped against each other in the small entry, one catching Mama’s flower vase from falling. The young man’s face inside the helmet looked fierce like the vase was at fault, the soldier not much older than Frida. The other SS stood outside the car. Eyes going around the farmhouse.
“Find him,” the Untersturmfuhrer said, scanning the front room, the two soldiers starting to go past him.

If there is one weakness in the novel, it’s that at times the author’s focus seems too wide, including events that don’t quite mesh with the plot (for example, mentioning the failed assassination attempts on Hitler or the day in May 1933 when German university students and non-students burned books they considered un-German, or when in August 1942, Switzerland closed its borders to civilians trying to flee the Nazi regime). The inclusion of these events distracts the reader from the main story. Perhaps the author wanted to remind us of the climate of fear and oppression that existed in Germany at the time. In other words, the novel is an act of remembrance, a way to alert us to the importance of knowing our history.

East Vancouverite Bill Paul enjoys photography and reading fiction and nonfiction. [Editor’s note: Bill has reviewed books by Meg Todd, Clea Young, Iona Whishaw, Stephen Osborne, Corinna Chong, Gurjinder Basran, Caroline Adderson, William Deverell, Deryn Collier, Jann Everard, Jack Lowe-Carbell, Martin West, Dietrich Kalteis, Suzannah Showler, Curtis LeBlanc, Patrick deWitt, Barbara Fradkin, Dietrich Kalteis, Stan Rogal, Keath Fraser, and John Farrow for BCR; he contributed a photo-essay, “Trevor Martin’s Vancouver,” in 2022.]

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The British Columbia Review

Interim Editors: Trevor Marc Hughes (nonfiction), Brett Josef Grubisic (fiction and poetry)
Publisher: Richard Mackie

Formerly The Ormsby Review, The British Columbia Review is an on-line book review and journal service for BC writers and readers. The Advisory Board now consists of Jean Barman, Wade Davis, Robin Fisher, Barry Gough, Hugh Johnston, Kathy Mezei, Patricia Roy, and Graeme Wynn. Provincial Government Patron (since September 2018): Creative BC. Honorary Patron: Yosef Wosk. Scholarly Patron: SFU Graduate Liberal Studies. The British Columbia Review was founded in 2016 by Richard Mackie and Alan Twigg.

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