"few films have been able to capture David Bowie’s charisma, but Oshima’s wartime drama is tailor-made for his talents."

"Jeff Bezos’s favorite novel, about a butler who wistfully recalls his career in service during wartime Great Britain. Bezos has said he learns more from novels than nonfiction."

"A hard, unflinching look at what it was like to resist during wartime France. Personally, I prefer Bob le flambeur, but any Melville is good Melville. And this is very, very good."

"Few films have been able to capture David Bowie’s charisma, but Oshima’s wartime drama seems tailor-made for his talents. Tom Conti has rarely been such a sympathetic guide for the audience’s emotions."

"A darkly epic, grisly, beguiling journey set amid the frozen tundra of wartime Russia. Delicious prose. Once its dirty claws break skin, that icy death grip won’t be letting go anytime soon. Unforgettable."

"I love all of Sarah Waters’ historical fiction but this is my favorite novel, set during and after WWII. It starts slow but picks up insane momentum, using reverse narration to follow the characters backward in time to the explosive wartime scenes that shaped them."