Ms. Woodstrom's first publication will help you understand the reason so many Germans viewed Hitler and his promises the way they did before and during WWII. This book is a first hand account from the author, presented in her voice at the various stages of her life during this time. She tells of the day-to-day life of her family and community and captures the perceptions that people had about Hitler, the economy, the reasons for this war and the drastic changes in their lives. It's a real insight into the struggles and the challenges and yes, even the joyful times. "War Child" not only kept me reading far into the night, it also left me feeling like I want to know more...what happened to her family, her neighbors and her town after she left? I have a new appreciation for the freedom and abundance here in America. This book is suitable for all ages.

The author points out that one third of Germany by 1932 is on public assistance allowing for one meager meal a day, due to the Great Depression and the extreme burdens of Versailles. The book details the results of the 2. Presidential Election April 10, 1932 with a clear majority for Hindenburg. The Government of Prussia declared that they found evidence that the Nazis prepared for a putsch. Chancellor Bruening and General Groener ,Minister of interior declared the SA , SS and Hitler youth banned. The Social Democrats and trade unions supported banning the Nazi activities and President Hindenburg signed the decree, which officially disolved the uniformed Nazis. Nazis urged resistance and continued underground. These uniformed Nazi groups had 400.000 men. The German army had 100.000 men, which was all Germany was allowed to have according to the Wilson Versailles "Peace" dictate ,which was never sanctioned by the USA . So the German army was outnumbered 4 to 1 by the Hitler troops. Now the following part is not mentioned in the book: July 20, 1932 Hitler troops came to Berlin and ousted by Military Coup the legitimate Social Democratic Prussian Government under Otto Braun . On July 20, 1944 , one of several attempts to oust the dictator Hitler and regain the legitimate government, failed. The leaders were hanged overnight. Otto Braun took refuge in Swizerland and after the war ended he asked the allies to help him restore the legitimate government, which was ousted by dictatorship in July 1932 . The allies were not interested in restoring legitimacy. Instead by the decrees of August 1945 in Potsdam and March 1947 cleared the way for the expulsion and ethnic cleansing of over 15 Million Eastern Germans, whose land was and to this day is illegally taken. Again Big Business made the policies.

EXTEMELY Interesting and HISTORICALLY acurate book written just prior to World War-II by an American Theodore Abel who went to Germany, witnessed the Depression, Inflation, Right and Left Wing rioting and activities, first hand.

Theodore Abel went further into understanding WHY and HOW Hitler and his Nationalist Socialist party took root among the "ordinary middle class and uneducated lower class German people" and he obtained thousands of autobiographies from the ordinary German people by offering prizes under the auspices of Columbia University. He received over 600 essays from Nazi Party members which revealed why they had embraced Nazi-ism and Hitler with the enthusiasm that they did.

Some of these essays are printed word for word in this book which Abel presents as the life histories of A WORKER, A SOLDIER, AN ANTI-SEMITE, A MIDDLE CLASS YOUTH, A FARMER, A BANK CLERK.

This books main purpose is to show in the light of the author's unique personal data, the relative importance of each of the factors which led to Hitler's rise to power.

Afer reading this book,...you be the judge of "COULD IT HAPPEN AGAIN?".

This book is mandatory reading to anyone interested in the Wehrmacht's campaigns on the Eastern Front. The study has been meticulously researched, is reflective, well written, and evidence that the author is one of the foremost experts of German military operations against the Soviet Union during 1942. The book is a scholarly, detailed study of the Luftwaffe's campaigns during this critical year, yet provides perfect analytical context by explaining army operations, which the Luftwaffe was closely affiliated and therefore necessary for understanding its own activities, and also the strategic/political factors driving the Wehrmacht's overall campaign. It also demonstrates, to often overlooked in most campaign studies, the significant role that individual personalities can, and do, play in war. This book is a MUST read to anyone that is especially interested in the Luftwaffe, joint warfare, dynamic leadership and airpower. All military practitioners, scholars and commentators will thoroughly enjoy reading it.

Recently I ordered 'Stopped at Stalingrad' from amazon.com. It was well worth the puchase, as the book is both a profoundly researched study and an interesting read. It's a scholarly work which, undoubtedly, will become a classic in its field.

Dénes Bernád, Aviation Historian and Author

Hayward believes that German air doctrine was too narrowly focused on tactical air support and ignored strategic targets. In his book, Hayward supports his thesis by stating that during the battle for Stalingrad,the Luftwaffe paid too much attention to supporting the ground forces and not enough attention to interdicting the ferries carrying Russian soldiers across the Volga river. Hayward also criticizes the Luftwaffe for not bombing the Caucasusian oil fields which could have severely hampered the Russian war effort. Finally, Hayward writes that the Luftwaffe was spread out to thinly to support the main thrust at Stalingrad and Manstein's southern advance in the Caucasus. I would strongly reccomend this book to anyone whose interested in the faults of German military doctine during World War II.

Biographies of Adolf Hitler are commonplace, but the first volume of Kershaw's new effort is well worth the read. Kershaw gets past the myths of Hitler to present a detailed, encyclopedic examination of his early life and rise to power. He manages the neat trick of remaining relatively dispassionate and objective about Hitler's political evolution. Kershaw also takes other historians to task for their assertion that Hitler was an energetic genius, revealing that much of the time Hitler was lazy and slothful and could not be bothered to pay attention to matters that did not intrigue him. The one downside of the book is that, in refusing to indulge the Hitler mythos, Hitler: 1889-1936 Hubris can be a bit dry in stretches. Still, it's worth it to see this new interpretation of Hitler's life and career.

We surely need books like Daniel Jonah Goldhagen's Hitler's Willing Executioners that examine German society as a whole in an effort to understand how Hitler came to power and held it for so long. But we also need classic, political biographies that focus on the dictator himself. Kershaw's book, the first volume of a projected two-part biography, pays some attention to how ripe a demoralized Germany was for demagoguery after the Treaty of Versailles, but the author's focus is on Hitler and his political career'the decisions he made as he rose to power and those he made once he attained it. What distinguishes this effort is the extent of documentation as Kershaw, a professor of history at the University of Sheffield, exploits the full Goebbels diaries and texts of early Hitler speeches only recently made accessible. Also notable is the portrait Kershaw draws of Hitler as surprisingly remote from the thuggery, greed and corruption of his followers, high and low, even as he actively encouraged the development of a cult of personality. Kershaw closes with an examination of Hitler's remilitarization of the Rhineland, a fait accompli made possible by the timidity and disarray of Germany's supine neighbors. Had the French marched, Hitler said later, "we would have had to withdraw... with our tails between our legs." By 1936, Kershaw writes, events had substantiated Hitler's hubris. A "nemesis" (subtitle of the next volume) would in reality not emerge before 1941. Kershaw's massive work (made somewhat too massive by some repetition) is valuable for the rigor with which it portrays Hitler not as some supernatural evil force ejected into history from beyond but as a thoroughly natural figure'evil, surely, but historically evil.

The two part Ian Kershaw's biography of Adolph Hitler are separate but equal portions of the life of Adolph Hitler, not the most popular, attractive or marketable of personages to dedicate a two volume biography. Though each volume is capable of standing on its own, both should be read in sequence.

The first volume, Hubris 1889-1936, deals with Hitler's origins, various incarnations, and initial rise to power in 1936. This volume ends with Hitler's controversial invasion of the Rhineland. The second volume, Nemesis: 1936-1945, immediately picks up where the first leaves off, and takes us through the escalating war to its inevitable conclusion just outside a bunker in Berlin within range of the Soviet's artillery. Throughout both, we walk uncomfortably close to Adolph Hitler, and his minions.

The overall work takes us through Hitler's full life in astonishing and carefully researched detail, clarifying and confirming what we knew, but more importantly debunking myths and leaving open to speculation events still without a definitive resolution. Where the author doesn't know and is forced to guess based upon what he does know, the reader is clearly informed. This is not often the case in many biographies and is a credit to this work.

Throughout, the reader will come away with a sense of the "history as close-call," as Hitler approaches total failure and obscurity several times only to move on to what will become his fateful destiny for both himself and the world. Like a good novel the author allows us to speculate on our own on what might have been if for example, Hitler had been admitted to the school of architecture in Vienna. The author builds suspense and drama throughout.

The second longer volume is a quicker and easier read, despite the occasionally gruesome subject matter. Nemesis takes us methodically through World War II. We are there for every decision, every triumph, and every failure. The slow unfolding of the war and the eventual turn of the tide against Germany is developed again with a keen sense of drama. The author develops the narrative as if we don't know what's going to happen next or how it will all end and does a fine job of it.

As one might expect, both volumes require a large emotional investment. But it is worth it if you are to understand much about where we are today and how we got here. If you were to ask yourself before you read these works and after, what shaped the twentieth century, you might very well arrive at two very different answers. It is often interesting to speculate on how the world would look today if there had been no Hitler. Fortunately the author spares us that speculation.

Many biographies to detriment stray from the subject matter to dwell on the peripheral matters with only remote ties to the subject matter. Not so here, the author rarely cuts way from his Hitler himself and even then only briefly. Very quickly we are back at Hitler's side watching over his shoulder or through the eyes of those around him. The author binds us to Hitler throughout making it clear that it is not always comfortable or safe to be in the room when Hitler loses his temper.

The Kershaw freely admits it was never his intent to write a biography of Hitler, and he is not enamoured of his subject. He takes an odious subject and brings it to life. This makes for an interesting well written, but ultimately disturbing biography of the man of the century.

This book has to be one of the longest biographies ever written about a historical figure, but it is greatly the worth the effort expended to read it. John Toland is as good a historian as one will ever experience in the modern era. His books, to a one, are eminently readable. There is no historian who has the ability to make his subjects appear so lifelike, even to those who lived long after the events he writes about. By taking actual quotes and putting them into proper context, Toland marinates a genre long known for its aridity. Hitler the man was as complex a person on the political stage as any that preceded him, or have followed. Toland wades through Hitler's many complexities and seeming contradictions, and sheds light on what drove the Fuhrer's madness and his need to bring Europe (and later the world) to the brink of destruction. Toland offers plausibility to what drove Hitler to vilify and massacre the Jewish race in Europe, his goals of conquest, and his political system...areas in which historians have argued about for generations. We learn many things about Hitler's childhood and early adulthood, things which may shed some light on the future dictator's raison d'etre. From a disappointing childhood to dreams of being an artist and architect in Vienna, Austria, to his service in the German army during World War I, Hitler's dreams of a Germanic empire are mapped out every stage of the way. Toland's treatment of Hitler is fair, which is deeply hard to do, as the leader of Germany's Third Reich has caused much misery and destruction to people all over the world. His detachment makes Hitler appear much more scarier. It is hard to envision a man who would hold so true to his demonic visions over a span of twenty years, as Hitler did with his blueprint for domination of Europe and the Soviet Union. If you love twentieth-century history, particularly that of World War II, this book will satisfy your craving...and then some! I highly recommend all of Toland's books relating to the World War II era, particularly "The Last 100 Days" and "Infamy," which is about the Pearl Harbor attack by Japan on the U.S. on December 7, 1941, and the apparent subsequent cover-up by the government of its foreknowledge of the attack. Toland has also written a couple of fictional books that are not quite as good, but worth a look-see.

I had the opportunity of corresponding and meeting John Toland when I was a teenager and he was a remarkable man and a great writer. This is by far the best and most readable biography ever written on Hitler. Toland eschews, thankfully, the ridiculous psycho-babble which ruins many other major Hitler biographies.

Toland interviewed over 300 people close to Hitler: Tradul Junge, his secretary, Max Wunsche and Richard Schultze, his adjutants, Eva Braun's best friend and many others. He went to the source and his oral interviews constitute a tremendous historical resource.

Toland shows that Hitler was sexually normal, which is important since Hitler's supposed "deviant sexuality" is the lynchpin of many inferior books.

If you are to read one book about Adolf Hitler, make it this one. Nothing better has come down the pike in the 25 years since this books publication. For anyone interested in the history of the 20th century and World War II, this is a must read.

Ever wonder what made Adolf Hitler one of this century's most reviled, yet powerful political leaders? Ever wonder what drove Hitler to his incessant desire to rid the world of Jews and all people of the "non-Aryan" race?

Well, if these questions continually vex you, you ought to read John Toland's splendid and provocative biography on Adolf Hitler. It is well-written, and very thorough, as it chronicles Hitler as a young boy growing up in Austria, to the founding of the Nazi party, and culminating with Hitler's ascension and command of the Third Reich. Toland provides probing insight into the forces (both in his personal life and the external political environment in Germany) which drove Hitler to relentless anti-Semitism, and the reasons for his obsession to rid the world of Jews.

He also delves into Hitler's troubled personal life, detailing his close relationship with his mother, and his somewhat ambiguous relationship with his wife, Eva Braun.

But Toland also describes other elements of Hitler's life which were more positive, such as the construction of the autobahnen (auto routes) for military transport, and the founding of the Volkswagen (the People's Car). While these are rather prominent cultural icons in today's society, who would attribute them to a man as hated and reviled as Hitler?

For anyone interested in obtaining a "complete" and "objective" picture of Adolf Hitler as a man who achieved great power and influence in one of the most economically advanced countries in the world, and not just a chronicling of his anti-Semitic actions (which should not be minimized), then I would strongly recommend John Toland's fascinating biography,"Adolf Hitler."

As a devoted reader of history, especially of the early 20th century period, I probably have gone through every popular and even arcane book on Hitler and National Socialism. I've read Albert Speer's "Inside the Third Reich," Shirer's "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reach," Alan Bullock's "Hitler and Stalin: Parallel Lives," . . . yet, these books, while informative, lack the depth of understanding of the horrible phenomenon of Hitler that Joachim Fest brings to his biography. Maybe because Fest himself is German and is therefore closer to his subject. Yes, the style is dry, and the book is indeed rather biased at times--the preface is titled incredibly "Hitler and Historical Greatness!" Yet, within that preface, you will find insights and observations that are lacking in all other biographies on the Fuehrer. I myself was riveted from page one all the way to the end. So, if you want to really understand Hitler, read this book. If you want to read a lighter biography, read the sections on Hitler in Bullock's "Hitler and Stalin: Parallel Lives."

This is a dense, thorough, anbd illuminating biography of a frightening and fascinating figure historian John Lukacs calls "the man of the century." I would be lying if I didn't say it's slow going; it's not a book for the faint of heart as Fest spends much of his time trying to explain the phenomenon of Hitler to a German audience. Was he an aberration? Was he an inevitable outcome of German culture? Those are the questions Fest tries to answer. Nevertheless, the book is full of original insights in Hitler's character that will linger long after the book is finished.

I read this book for a graduate-level course on the history of Nazi Germany. Fest provides great insight into Hitler's development and personality, in his dry, somber German way. As a reference, it is undeniably one of the best out there on the subject. As a textbook, it requires coffee to finish reading. However, any student is perfectly capable of finishing and garnering great knowledge from this book.

Albert Speer had circumstances in which no author would ever imagine himself: a 20 year sentence in a former concentration camp to write his recollections of his career in Hitler's Germany. This book serves as a cautionary tale of what can (and did) happen when people succumb to dazzling propaganda and forceful leaders. It also describes one man's disastrous personal deal with the devil.

Speer's interest in architecture is evident throughout this dense book, and those who don't share his fascination may find these passages tedious. But overall, the book gives a unique look at the inner workings of the Nazi regime and its notorious leaders, as well as insight into Speer's compromise with principles.

Speer details the obsession Hitler had with remaking Berlin (and subsequently, Germany and beyond) into an ostentatious showplace of power and grandeur. Hitler delighted in the models of government buildings, boulevards and a colossal dome that was to hold hundreds of thousands of spectators and strike the viewer with awe.

Indeed, much of what Speer ended up creating for Hitler utterly lacked soul and a place for the common man. All the grand plans and sumptuous buildings negated Man's significance: only the Party meant anything. Speer discovers, years into his career, that the Nazis had contrived to install talented functionaries in service of the Reich, each doing his job but unaware of the others and their responsibilities. It was to be a society of compartmentalized citizens where the oft-mocked phrase "I was only following orders" becomes the sickening watchword for mass murder and destruction.

Speer was drawn to Hitler's schemes through personal attraction: here was the man to hitch his professional star to. Speer acknowledges that he made a deal with evil and never listened to the nagging doubts during the hectic, heady years of Reich-building. He writes that after signing up with the Nazis, he assumed the more unsavory parts of their agenda (anti-Semitism, brute force and political intimidation) were merely growing pains and would be jettisoned once they gained national power. What ensued were years of complicity and compromise that Speer admits was part of the worst crimes against humanity.

I kept wondering as I read: what would have happened to Speer had he not sought such mentors and benefactors as the Nazis? Would his talent as an architect flourish despite the evils of his time? Did he bristle at the ever larger building schemes and grandiose plans that Hitler devised, making a mockery of true professional discipline? Here is a man who essentially threw his life away - first with the biggest bunch of criminals in history, then in isolated imprisonment in Spandau. This is more than a book about where one's decisions lead in life; it is about how good can be tainted by evil if the price is right. Speer cautions future generations against following demagogues and against the hollow promises of technology. Apparently, the world has yet to fully learn from his example.

I had seen the movie version of "Inside the Third Reich" many times before I read the book so I thought I knew what to expect. I should not have been surprised that I found the book even more compelling than the movie (which BTW was very well done!).

Albert Speer was one of the small group of Hitler's paladins who was present from his early days until the end. With a seemingly average architectural career in front of him a young Speer is captivated by the Fuhrer during the early "days of struggle" (of the Nazi party) after Hitler's release from Landsberg prison. His awe of Hitler as a speaker and magnetic personality, and Hitler's longing to be an "artist" brought the two together and a mutual respect and friendship grew from these likes. According to Speer's accounts his only real contact with Hitler on a professional level in the early years (even through the first years of the war) was related to architecture. Speer was commissioned for several party and later state projects - this despite Prof.Todt and his organization being the chosen "party" architects. When Todt was killed in a plane crash, Speer filled the void. He and Hitler planned to rebuild Berlin (as Germania) as the seat of power in all of Europe (and the world?) in grand fashion. Many of Hitler's own personal drawings for structures, such as a great arch to dwarf the Arch de Truimphe, survived the war in Speer's possession and are presented in the book. These tidbits of "artisan" sidelines are a fascinating piece of history not found elsewhere. One sees another side of Adolf Hitler - one that however still retains his now expected megalomania. As the war progressed and Speer's connections with Hitler were strengthened he attained greater stature and eventually became the Minister of Armaments. In this capacity Speer really found his calling. Many books have touched on the genius that was Speer's in terms of war production. Under Speer's reign, despite the western allies and Russian's closing in from either side and continual air bombardment, war production continued to increase right up to the last couple of months of the war. This is an amazing testament to Speer and his thoroughly Germanic approach to production. It however required slave labor on the backs of hundreds of thousands from the "Minderwertigen" (inferior races), which the Nazi movement looked to erase (and tried very hard to do) from existence. While Speer is one of the few Nazi's who stated that ALL Germans were responsible for the war and it's atrocities - he has often been called the "Good Nazi" (sarcastically) for his statements - he does not really ooze remorse for his slave labor program, which kept the war moving and continued to cause the deaths of so many. He does however make a strong point in these memoirs to give the reader the clear impression that he did everything he could at the end - when he apparently came to his better senses - to end the war and its associated suffering. These claims, from most accounts, seem to be merited. Yet many in the Nazi regime had changes of heart as the walls closed in so we should not have expected anything less from someone of Speer's intelligence.

All in all this book as a really good read with plenty of material not found elsewhere (unless rehashed from Speer's works themselves) to chew on. Whether Speer was a "Good Nazi" or not is not a judgment I would make. I do however feel that he left a Good account of the rise and fall of the Nazi movement and provides plenty of insight into the inner workings of Hitler's power elite. This book should adorn all bookshelves of serious WWII history students.

I read with great interest Albert Speer's book "Inside the 3rd Reich". I believe that everybody interested in modern history should read about Hitler's Germany, and this book gives an intimate insider's view of the Inner Circle around the 'Fuehrer'. But is it sincere? Just how captivating Speer's elaborately woven net of deception and self-deception, of partial admission of 'collective' guilt (and thus personal absolvation) is I experienced myself when reading "Inside the 3rd Reich". In particular when Speer describes his last visit in the 'Fuehrerbunker' and claims to have confessed his late opossition to Hitler's 'Scorched Earth' strategy, and when he writes about the 'fit of weeping' that came over him after he realized the extent of destruction in Europe in the days after Hitler's death, one almost believes him that he 'didn't know' anything, just did his duty as any good German for the war effort, and that his devotion to Hitler had blinded him against the inmesurable crime he helped to perpetrate. Thus, almost from the first line on, Speer sets out to spring an elaborate trap, carefully, subtly - a trap for the reader, almost inescapable. At the end of the book, the reader has fallen prey, to the illusion that Speer was basically a 'good guy', not really a 'Nazi' at all, and in fact wanted to even assasinate Hitler in the end. In reality, Speer was even worse than Himmler, Bormann, Ley, Goering and the others, since in his case one cannot excuse his participation in the Nazi nightmare with the lack of intelligence. On the contrary: Speer was THE intellectual in this circle, rivalled only by Goebbels, yet Speer not a fanatic, but even worse - a technocrat in a void of morality, with the only selfish aim of advancing himself, of gathering power, maybe succeeding Hitler? Speer wanted success, success at any price. And this is Speer, dangerously intelligent, incredibly selfish, who set out to narrate "his" story, in which he appears to admit guilt but in fact absolves himself from responsibility. The aim? Success, again. And he got it. This book, a masterful piece of deception, dramaturgically remastering history (Speer's suicidal confession to Hitler never took place, for example) became THE best seller after WW II! As Speer said about Hitler once: You hardly recognize the devil when he puts his hand on your shoulder. True, indeed! Yet, the devil comes in many forms - and it appears that occasionally - he writes a book! Yours Sincerely, Imre Berger, PhD Dept. of Biology, MIT iberger@rich.mit.edu on "Inside the 3rd Reich" (Erinnerungen, by A. Speer)

Brilliant. No, not the plot, which is certainly above average, but mostly typical of a good suspense thriller. What's brilliant about Robert Harris' "Fatherland" is the concept. The events of this suspense thriller are set in 1964, in post World War II Germany. Nothing unusual so far. Until you realize that Germany has won the war, Europe is dominated by the victorious German reich, and that celebrations are underway for Hitler's 75th birthday. It is this alternate history that makes "Fatherland" a thriller that stands out from the average.

Is it plausible? Harris is well-qualified to write such an alternate history, having written a well-researched non-fiction book on Hitler. In fact the events of "Fatherland" are mostly rooted in history, as Harris notes at the end of the book that many of the characters whose names are used in this novel actually existed, and many of the documents quoted in the text are authentic. The novel centers around the historic Wannsee Conference of 1942, where Hitler's top men met to decide on a permanent solution to the Jewish question: extermination in the horrific gas chambers in places like Auschwitz.

The plot itself is credible and fast moving, although those who are offended by vulgar language, blasphemy and immorality will find these occurring rather too frequently. Xavier March is a criminal investigator who is determined to get to the bottom of the mystery around the body of an old man found floating in a lake outside Berlin. His investigation leads him to discover a series of deaths of high ranking officials. Together with Charlotte Maguire, an American journalist, he uncovers the chilling truth and the heart of the dark conspiracy behind these deaths. But can March and Maguire escape the German reich with a story about a secret so horrible that Hitler's men have done everything possible to remove all trace of? And if they are caught, can they withstand the torture that is sure to follow?

The concept of a political cover-up, government conspiracy in at the highest level, and those threatening to expose it being silenced with death, is not a new concept. But by dressing this concept in new garments of an alternate history, Harris has created a novel that surpasses the average suspense thriller. The alternate history is in many respects fictional, but at its core it is about a horrible reality that is just as shocking today as it was when it was conceived in 1942. In producing "Fatherland", Harris has fathered a novel with a concept so brilliant, that the chilling non-fiction aspects of its story become all the more shocking. And that's why this is a novel not worth missing.

Berlin, 1964.
20 years have passed since Germany's victory over the Allies in World War II. Adolf Hitler has been in power for 31 years, his 75th birthday nears, and a summit meeting between the Fuhrer and President Kennedy has been announced.
This is the intriguing scenario presented by British journalist-novelist Robert Harris in his first novel, Fatherland.
Harris' novel, unlike Peter Tsouras' Disaster at D-Day: The Germans Defeat the Allies, June 1944, doesn't offer us a very detailed 'alternative history' of the Second World War, which perhaps would have been the easy way out for a lesser writer. Instead, Harris smartly teases us with little glimpses at how Germany could have won the war while still losing its collective soul.
Fatherland's plot revolves around Xavier March, a former U-boat skipper who has joined the German police, which has been under SS control since the mid-1930s. On a rainy April morning, March has been called to investigate what seems to be a routine incident ' a corpse has been found in the Havel River near the area where high Nazi party officials have their mansions.
Of course, if you have read political-police thrillers such as Gorky Park or Archangel, you know there will be nothing routine about this investigation. For this corpse's identity is none other than Doctor Josef Buhler, one of the earliest Nazi party members and former state secretary in the General Government, the part of Poland directly annexed by the Third Reich during the war. Before long, March (who is not a Nazi party member, just a dogged investigator) will follow Buhler's seemingly routine death down a dark and winding path that will lead him to Germany's darkest and best kept secret of all.
For history buffs, this book is a fascinating look at what a mid-1960s Nazi Germany might have been like. Harris paints a chilling portrait of a country still at war with what remains of the Soviet Union while in a cold war with a nuclear-armed United States. Berlin is imagined as Hitler and his architect Albert Speer would have rebuilt it at war's end (in the frontispiece there is an artist's rendering of Hitler's vision for his capital), and readers will shudder with horror to see how far the Nazis' indoctrination of children extended.
Harris keeps things going at a brisk pace, never boring readers or insulting their intelligence. His fictional characters interact with historical characters (although, of course, their fates ended up differently in real life, thank goodness) in a believable fashion. Of course, this type of novel requires willing suspension of disbelief, but it is well-written and, in the end, eye-opening.

I was immediately intrigued with the premise behind Robert Harris' novel Fatherland. What would have happened if Hitler's Germany had won World War II? The reader is taken to Berlin, 1964, which has become a sort of Shangra-la for Europe. U.S. President Kennedy has agreed to come to Berlin for a peace summit, and the capital is swarming with tourists and citizens ready to observe the 75th birthday of Hitler. During all this, though, the body of a high-ranking Nazi is washed up on a shore. Detective Xavier March, a former U-boat captain and SS Sturmbannfuhrer, is dispatched to investigate. His investigation uncovers an old conspiracy among high-ranking Nazis. March, who is not the cold, unhuman Nazi that is common in his country, teams up with an American Journalist, Charlotte Maguire, to find proof and escape alive.

There were many good things about this book. Its setting is very realistic and depressing, its characters range from the intrepid March to the evil Globus, a former Concentration Camp commander who is determined to end March's investigation, to Maguire, the journalist who wants the truth. Although I enjoyed the book very much, I would have liked more details on the resolution of the war, but this book will both frighten and delight. I loved this book and think that you will love it too.