Book excerpt: This book is a well-reasoned and thoroughly-documented exploration of both the historical context and political dynamics of Germany's unification. Grtemaker analyzes the threads that connect recent German developments to the nation's past and also shows those aspects of the process of German reintegration that reflect profound discontinuity. Unifying Germany, 1989-90 is one of the fullest English-language treatments on the process yet produced. It gives a bird's-eye view of the events large and small that led to unification in Germany as well as painting the broader picture of communism's decline throughout eastern Europe. Readers will be particularly interested in the detailed study of the genesis of the liberalizing drive within the German Democratic Republic and the official reaction - on both sides of the Berlin Wall - to this phenomenon.