Published to tie-in with the Hollywood blockbuster THE READER starring Ralph Fiennes and Kate Winslet THE READER has become a literary sensation and international bestseller Published to critical acclaim across the world, it has been translated into 39 languages It has sold over 300,000 copies in Phoenix Paperback alone It reprints regularly - 30 times to date An Oprah Book Club selection Schlink has received exceptional reviews for his masterpiece: 'For generations to come, people will be reading and marvelling over Bernhard Schlink's THE READER' Evening Standard 'A sensitive, daring, deeply moving book about the tragic results of fear and the redemptive power of understanding' Ruth Rendell 'A formally beautiful, disturbing and finally morally devastating novel' LA Times 'Moving, suggestive and ultimately hopeful... Leaps national boundaries and speaks straight to the heart' New York Times Book Review 'Examines the nature of understanding and tests the limits of forgiveness... The result is as compelling as any thriller' The Times 'Readers of the book - thousands, one hopes - will understand the nature of atonement when they have finished reading it' Daily Telegraph

Shortlisted for Heathrow Travel Product Award: Travel Read, Fiction 2009.

"Schlink's novel has a wondeful clarity of style that serves to emphasise the moral complexity of its subject matter" DAILY TELEGRAPH "The Reader cannot be ignored. It challenges core definitions of good and evil...The Reader brings us face to face with how little we know about the people around us" -- Norman Lebrecht EVENING STANDARD "A powerful book, it lingers in the mind" OXFORD TIMES "a profound and deeply moving examination of what drives perfectly ordinary people to do the most appalling things...hard to put down" YORK PRESS "A hauntingly beautiful read" SUFFOLK FREE PRESS "This mesmerising novel is a story of love and secrets, horror and compassion, unfolding against the haunted landscape of post-war Germany" WESTERN MORNING NEWS "A tender, horrifying novel that shows blazingly well how the Holocaust should be dealt with in fiction" MATURE TIMES

Bernhard Schlink was born in Germany in 1944. He is a professor of law at the University of Berlin and a practising judge. He lives in Bonn and Berlin.