Malve von Hassell is a freelance writer and translator. She holds a Ph.D. in anthropology from the New School for Social Research. She has taught at Queens College, Baruch College, Pace University, and Suffolk County Community College, while continuing her work as a translator and writer.
In addition to several academic titles, she has edited her grandfather Ulrich von Hassell's memoirs written in prison in 1944, Der Kreis schließt sich - Aufzeichnungen aus der Haft 1944 (Propylaen Verlag 1994). She has published two children's picture books, Tooth Fairy (Amazon KDP 2012/2020), and Turtle Crossing (Amazon KDP 2023), and her translation and annotation of a German children's classic by Tamara Ramsay, Rennefarre: Dott's Wonderful Travels and Adventures (Two Harbors Press, 2012).
She published three historical fiction novels for young adults, The Falconer's Apprentice (Namelos, 2015/KDP 2024), Alina: A Song for the Telling (BHC Press, 2020), and The Amber Crane (Odyssey Books, 2021), and a biographical work about a woman coming of age in Nazi Germany, Tapestry of My Mother's Life: Stories, Fragments, and Silences (Next Chapter Publishing, 2021), also available in German, Bildteppich Eines Lebens: Erzählungen Meiner Mutter, Fragmente Und Schweigen (Next Chapter Publishing, 2022).
Her most recent releases were a new edition of her ethnography, The Struggle for Eden: Community Gardens in New York City (IngramSpark and KDP Amazon, 2025), and The Price of Loyalty: Serving Adela of Blois (Historium Press, 2025), a historical fiction novel set in the 11th and 12th centuries.
The life of Adela of Blois, daughter of William the Conqueror and wife to one of the most powerful men in 11th century France, is conveyed through the perspective of two individuals. Cerdic, a man trapped between worlds, yearns for the land of his childhood, England, but owes his loyalty to King William, the Norman king who showed him charity, and to Adela, his daughter, his first friend in a strange land.
He is torn between two women, Adela whom he has loved for years and Giselle, whom he weds in an arranged marriage. Giselle is in love with the tall knight with the strange name; determined to shape her own destiny, she follows Cerdic on a crusade. Will Cerdic learn where his true feelings lie before it is too late?
Published 2025 by Historium Press.
The Amber Crane
Pushing the boundaries of time-slip fiction and of your imagination, The Amber Crane is a tale of a journey from the past into an unimaginable future, set in two devastating wars three hundred years apart and steeped in the lore and legends of amber from the shores of the Baltic Sea.
Clutching precious amber found in a clump of seaweed, PETER, an amber guild apprentice in Pomerania in the waning years of the Thirty Years' War, has a choice to make. Despite the severe penalties imposed on such an action, Peter keeps the amber and works on it in secret, with potentially disastrous consequences for people close to him. Meanwhile, unaware of the amber piece's magical powers, Peter finds himself drawn into a world three hundred years in the future where he gets embroiled in the troubles of a mysterious stranger.
Published 2021 by Odyssey Books; 2nd edition independently published.
Alina: A Song for the Telling
In this coming-of-age novel set in the 12th century, Alina, an aspiring musician from Provence, and her brother embark on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land to pray for their father's soul and to escape from their aunt and uncle's strictures. Their journey east takes them through the Byzantine Empire all the way to Jerusalem, where Alina is embroiled in political intrigue, theft, and murder, and finds her voice.
Published 2020 by BHC Press; second edition independently published.
The Falconer's Apprentice
Andreas, an adventuresome 15-year-old orphan, embarks on a precipitous flight across Europe to rescue the falcon Adela. A crotchety falconer, a secretive trader and his feisty daughter, a mysterious hermit, a young king in prison, an aging emperor, and an irascible Arab physician are among the principal characters in this action/adventure novel, set in the 13th century.
Written for readers age twelve and above, this coming-of-age story conveys life in medieval Europe, with bedbugs next to silver chalices, food ranging from the moldy to the sublime, and intellectual sophistication side by side with rank superstitions.
Published 2015 by Namelos; second edition independently published.
Tapestry of My Mother's Life: Stories, Fragments, and Silences
Tapestry of My Mother's Life is a biographical account of a woman coming of age in Germany during the 1930s. Malve von Hassell explores her mother's life through the fragmented lens of transmitted memory, and its impact on the second generation.
The portrayal also focuses on the role of memory: shaped, distorted, and realigned in the continual process of telling stories of the past in conjunction with silence about many aspects.
Children of women who shared similar experiences and life trajectories struggled with the challenge of learning about their parents' lives during extraordinary times, confounded by a wealth of stories on the one hand and a seemingly impenetrable veil of silence on the other.
Published 2021 by Next Chapter Publishing.
Turtle Crossing
Moving from home is hard. It is even harder for young children, who cannot imagine a world beyond the one they have always known.
Oliver the turtle experiences this first hand. Reluctant to leave his home, he finally runs to catch up with his parents. Oliver has some adventures along the way and learns an important lesson in the process.
Enjoy this read-aloud picture book with your child. For inquiring minds some interesting facts about turtles are included at the end, answering questions the reader might have about turtles.
Independently published 2021.
Letters from the Tooth Fairy
Did you ever wonder what the Tooth Fairy does with the teeth she collects? Were you ever curious about the place where the Tooth Fairy lives? What does the Tooth Fairy do when she gets tired of her job? Read these letters and you will find out.
The book consists of a total of ten letters from the Tooth Fairy to an eight-year-old boy in response to his letters placed under the pillow. The Tooth Fairy describes her world to the boy in response to his attempts to reach out and communicate.
A read-aloud picture book to entertain adults and children alike.
Independently published 2012/2020.
The Struggle for Eden: Community Gardens in New York City
This paperback edition of the original hardcover (2002) is a portrayal of the political, economic, and cultural history of community gardens in a New York City neighborhood, the Lower East Side of Manhattan. An ethnographic study of a particular instance of urban history, it provides a basis for an understanding of urban community gardens in the United States.
Published 2002 by Bergin & Garvey; second edition independently published.
Homesteading in New York City 1978-1993: The Divided Heart of Loisaida
This is an ethnographic study of predominantly Puerto Rican low-income people on the Lower East Side of Manhattan who have been involved in the rehabilitation of abandoned buildings through sweat-equity urban homesteading from 1978 to 1993.
The study combines a portrait of homesteading in a contemporary urban environment with an analysis of homesteading in the context of economic and political developments at the local, state, and national levels.
Published 1996. Praeger Publishing (paperback), Bergin and Garvey (hardcover).
Malve von Hassell is a freelance writer and translator. She holds a Ph.D. in anthropology from the New School for Social Research. She has taught at Queens College, Baruch College, Pace University, and Suffolk County Community College, while continuing her work as a translator and writer.
The life of Adela of Blois, daughter of William the Conqueror and wife to one of the most powerful men in 11th century France, is conveyed through the perspective of two individuals. Cerdic, a man trapped between worlds, yearns for the land of his childhood, England, but owes his loyalty to King William, the Norman king who showed him charity, and to Adela, his daughter, his first friend in a strange land.
Pushing the boundaries of time-slip fiction and of your imagination, The Amber Crane is a tale of a journey from the past into an unimaginable future, set in two devastating wars three hundred years apart and steeped in the lore and legends of amber from the shores of the Baltic Sea.
In this coming-of-age novel set in the 12th century, Alina, an aspiring musician from Provence, and her brother embark on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land to pray for their father's soul and to escape from their aunt and uncle's strictures. Their journey east takes them through the Byzantine Empire all the way to Jerusalem, where Alina is embroiled in political intrigue, theft, and murder, and finds her voice.
Andreas, an adventuresome 15-year-old orphan, embarks on a precipitous flight across Europe to rescue the falcon Adela. A crotchety falconer, a secretive trader and his feisty daughter, a mysterious hermit, a young king in prison, an aging emperor, and an irascible Arab physician are among the principal characters in this action/adventure novel, set in the 13th century.
Tapestry of My Mother's Life is a biographical account of a woman coming of age in Germany during the 1930s. Malve von Hassell explores her mother's life through the fragmented lens of transmitted memory, and its impact on the second generation.
Moving from home is hard. It is even harder for young children, who cannot imagine a world beyond the one they have always known.
Did you ever wonder what the Tooth Fairy does with the teeth she collects? Were you ever curious about the place where the Tooth Fairy lives? What does the Tooth Fairy do when she gets tired of her job? Read these letters and you will find out.
This paperback edition of the original hardcover (2002) is a portrayal of the political, economic, and cultural history of community gardens in a New York City neighborhood, the Lower East Side of Manhattan. An ethnographic study of a particular instance of urban history, it provides a basis for an understanding of urban community gardens in the United States.
This is an ethnographic study of predominantly Puerto Rican low-income people on the Lower East Side of Manhattan who have been involved in the rehabilitation of abandoned buildings through sweat-equity urban homesteading from 1978 to 1993.
