Gunter Grass - The Box Tales from the Darkrroom torrent

Eight adult children assemble over several months to recall memories of their father, a famous writer, and Marie, a photographer whose pictures inspired his work. The children, born of several women, recall an emotionally distant father, moving from household to household, with some of the children not learning of their siblings until adulthood. The one constant was Marie and her miraculous box of a camera, an old-fashioned Agfa, that “knew what had been and what was to be, and what people wish for.” Ordinary shots showed the eventual destruction of the Berlin Wall, ships sinking, bomb blasts from WWII, desired careers and relationships, and secret thoughts. The children, among them a photographer, nurse, and actress, now parents themselves, review their parents’ turbulent relationships and their father’s fame and constant work and speculate on the magic wrought by Marie. German author Grass delivers a fictionalized, engaging, and meandering look at his own life through the eyes of his children