NEW RELEASE SEPTEMBER 2025
Berlin Bar Stories
Berlin, 2014. Twenty-five years after the wall fell, the city still bleeds.
Laura, a Belgian costume designer drowning her sorrows in Moscow Mules, thinks she’s just another wanderer moving through Berlin’s bars. But when her cousin Jan crashes into her favorite spot, and into her carefully constructed life, everything changes. Old wounds rip open, forcing them both to face the childhood trauma they’ve spent years avoiding.
Through the eyes of bartenders and artists, lovers and lost souls, Berlin Bar Stories reveals how trauma and love travel across borders and generations, how strangers become lifelines, and how a city’s scars mirror our own. These interwoven narratives build toward a devastating truth: sometimes healing requires us to shatter everything we’ve built to survive.
About Nathalie
Nathalie Dewalhens is a Belgian-born author whose work explores the intricate landscape of human desire, grief, and transformation.
Her debut novel, Berlin Bar Stories, emerged from a decade of living in Berlin. During her years in the city, while guiding tourists, she authored 500 Hidden Secrets of Berlin (Luster Publishers, Antwerp), which became a go-to guide for visitors seeking an alternative angle to the city.
In 2019, she self-published Your Body, My Poem, a book that combines intimate photographs with erotic poetry.
Her poems, written in English, Dutch, and French, have appeared in various literary publications.
Now based near Granada, Spain, she leads transformative workshops both online and in person, ranging from intimate writing circles to deep-dive explorations of love, sexuality, and shadow work.
"That bar, that vodka, that man and that woman. That neigh- bourhood. That counter. That pissoir outside. That city. That moment. This!"
"She sees me exactly as I am: a totally overworked single mother, consumed by guilt, whose looks are already fading, who gained some weight and who could do with a good haircut, some kindness and a good fuck."
"I go to the bathroom where I find my small green pouch hidden in my toilet bag and line up a thick hit of coke."
My Books
Your Body, My Poem
Berlin Bar Stories
Through Berlin’s kaleidoscope of bar stories—each standing alone like shots of vodka—trauma binds strangers and cities together. When two cousins reunite after thirty years, their shared darkness finally finds its way toward light.
The 500 Hidden Secrets of Berlin
The 500 Hidden Secrets of Berlin is the perfect book for those who wish to discover the city without ending up in all the usual tourist haunts, as well as for residents who are keen to track down the city’s best-kept secrets.
Blog posts from BerlinBarStories.com
How to understand Belgium in 14 chapters
I left the tiny country of Belgium in 2003, not out of hate or despise, but because I needed more air, more openness, more heart connection and less pollution. Corsica, Southern France, Andalusia and Berlin were and are also part of my home/heart now. But it is always very easy to go back to Mother Belgium. I know the rules, the languages, the humor, and the difference between a lager and a Trappist. It is probably one of the ugliest countries in the world but it (therefore?) also produces excellent art. In my humble opinion the reason behind this, is that, if you cannot loose yourself in nature since there’s hardly any left of it (and the weather really sucks), you have to find beauty and transcendence in art.
Memento Mori
I just happen to love graveyards in Berlin. (Does that make me weird? Maybe just a little.) They’re beautiful, green, a little chaotic and incredibly peaceful. And they are soooooo quiet. Because death people are pretty good at being quiet. In a way, the death are not dead. Not as in “oooooohooooohooo we are haunting the graveyard“, no not at all, but more as “we existed, we meant something for someone, our lives did matter and we hope yours matter and take it from us: live your life as hard as you can. Grab these moments.” And so I walk totally zen through this beautiful gardens and listen to their silence.
Generous Jamie
It’s been a while since I posted a concert review. And nope, this blog post isn’t one neither. Therefore, it isn’t neutral enough. But wtf, I have no boss, no record company, not even a proofreaders who will give me a hard time. This used to be much different back in the nineties.
Back then I worked for a small independent Belgian record company. As every independent they struggled and are still struggling and barely can survive the MP3 era. I worked my ass off en felt terribly responsible for “my” artists. That used to be mainly people from the so-called world music scene. World music was hot in the nineties thanks to people like Ry Cooder who introduced to Western world to the Buena Vista Social Club and broadened our musicalal horizon.
One of those typical Berlin weekends
It is the last weekend before school starts again. So what does a Belgian forty something does in Berlin when she’s not working on her book? This for instance:
An ideal way to start a long weekend is with a lunch on Friday. As mentioned before on this blog, cheap, healthy lunches aren’t hard to find in Berlin. Even in our tourist crowded neighbourhood which is called Scheunenviertel. I often take my kids out to lunch and today is no exception. Today, Elmo and I try Il Mercante del Sud, an authentic Italian cantina situated in front of the Jewish Friedhof, in de Große Hamburgerstr. 21. This is an aera of Berlin crowded with tourists but this friendly place is a relief compared to all the tourists
A walk in the park
I am in the Monbijou Park, trying to rest from an emotional week. But my mind wanders. The world around me does the same. Wandering, moving, playing, shouting and running.
There’s a the really good busker singing in front of the Bode Museum. A human, a guitar and an amplifier. Sometimes that’s all it takes to stop the earth from turning.
People don’t know whether they have to wear their coats are not. Some machos in T-shirts show off their muscles. I laugh about it but like the eye bath.
Telling Tales. A writing workshop, tons of stories and beautiful people
Wedding. Red Wedding that is. One of the few parts of Berlin never to vote for the Nazis. Wedding is still a largely working class area, very multicultural too. It is also probably the most authentic district of Berlin. And as other parts of Berlin are raising their prices on every level, Wedding is still affordable although the artists are slowly discovering the area which means the gentrification slowly begins. That also means that you can already have a damn good soy cappuccino for a humble 2 euros. I am not against gentle gentrification as long as it doesn’t kill the identity of the Kiez.