Kasper Mützenmacher’s Cursed Hat (Life Indigo #1)
Kasper Mützenmacher keeps a divine “wishing hat”—a thought-operated teleportation device—locked in the wall safe of his Berlin hat shop. According to an old prophecy, after Kasper’s Greek ancestor stole the wishing hat from Hermes, Fate cursed his progeny to sell hats, on pain of mayhem or death. Kasper, however, doesn’t mind making hats, and he loves Berlin’s cabaret scene even more. But his carefree life of jazz and booze comes to a screeching halt when he must use the wishing hat to rescue his flapper girlfriend Isana from the shadowy Klaus, a veil-wearing Nazi who brainwashes his victims until they can’t see their own faces.
Isana and Kasper’s happiness proves fleeting. Years after her mysterious death, Kasper struggles as a lonely, single father of two until he meets Rosamund Lux, recently released from a political prison where Klaus took her face. Kasper soon suspects that Rosamund is no ordinary woman. According to the prophecy, certain Lux women descend from the water nymph Daphne, who, during Olympian times, transformed into a laurel tree to avoid Apollo’s sexual advances; they, too, suffer from an intergenerational curse connected to Hermes’ stolen hat. As Kasper falls deeper in love, Rosamund’s mental health deteriorates. She has nightmares and delusions about Klaus, and warns that he will launch a night of terror once he’s collected enough faces.
Kasper dismisses the growing Nazi threat until the government reclassifies him as a Jew in 1938. His plan to emigrate unravels when anti-Jewish riots erupt and the Nazis start loading Jews on boxcars to Dachau. Then Rosamund goes missing, and Klaus steals the wishing hat, the family’s only means of escape.
Kasper, however, will face his most difficult battle in America. He must convince his wayward son and indifferent grandson to break the curse that has trapped the family in the hat business for sixteen centuries. Their lives will depend on it.
Book One of the Life Indigo series, Kasper Mützenmacher’s Cursed Hat is a fantastical family saga about tradition, faith, and identity, set during the Jazz Age, Nazi Germany, and the Detroit race riots of 1943.
My Review:
Kasper Mützenmacher's Cursed Hat is the debut book from Keith Fentonmiller. A book that takes the reader on a challenging journey through Nazi Germany and the United States, where the story's characters face constant trials in what is a very emotional and original story. A mixture of alternate history and urban fantasy would be my guess. It is a book that explores the depths of human tragedy and misery - and even though it takes place in the past - it is something that I believe, many people will be able relate to on some level.
The book chronicles not only the life of Kasper Mützenmacher (through childhood to old age), but also tells the story of his father (to some extent), his mother, his children and his loves. It is a tale that speaks loudly of the human misery that took place in Nazi Germany and also the prejudices and racism that took place in Detroit during the time of the riots. The racial terms and stereotypes used throughout the book become 'heavy' and burdensome on the soul. It strikes the heart and opens the eyes to the misery that humans can afflict on other human beings. I believe the author brought across the feeling of racism and the pain and division that racism creates very well. Kasper Mützenmacher eventually escapes Nazi Germany but is unable to escape racism and hatred when he ends up in Detroit, where racism against Jews and African Americans runs rampant.
The plot, at times, felt a bit meandering and I felt that the story was being bogged down by superfluous detail and dialogue which didn't help the story progress. At the same time, the author managed to create a realistic environment for his characters and the characters were all well developed.
As the title also suggests, there is a curse involved, but the author didn't spend too much time integrating this curse into the story's main events. The curse and the cursed hat, while playing a very important role in the decision making of some characters, deserved much more time in the spotlight than it did. Due to its chronicling nature, the book lacked some plot elements (or else they were obscured). I'm not sure where the exact climax in the book would have been. The resolution of the story also happened really quickly, and for me, left me wanting some more explanations.
In Kasper Mützenmacher's Cursed Hat, the author creating an original story with elements of alternate history and urban fantasy/myth. Keith Fentonmiller also did a superb job in showing the disgusting and misery-inflicting results of racism and prejudice. Kasper Mützenmacher's Cursed Hat, had originally given me the impression of being either a young adult or 'kid-friendly' book. The book does contain some sexual situations and due to it's use of language, drug use, racial terms and stereotypes, is probably not suited for our younger readers. Even though the book seemed slow and arduous at times, I look forward to reading the second installment of the series and finding out where this cursed/magical journey takes us.
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