Reunited brothers confront a secret Allied betrayal in postwar Munich.
Occupied Munich, 1946: Irina, a Cossack refugee, confesses to murdering a GI, but American captain Harry Kaspar doesn’t buy it. As Harry scours the devastated city for the truth, it leads him to his long-lost German brother, Max, who returned to Hitler’s Germany before the war.
Max has a questionable past, and he needs … questionable past, and he needs Harry for the cause that could redeem him: rescuing Irina’s stranded clan of Cossacks who have been disowned by the Allies and are now being hunted by Soviet death squads–the cold-blooded upshot of a callous postwar policy.
As a harsh winter brews, the Soviets close in and the Cold War looms, Harry and Max desperately plan for a risky last-ditch rescue on a remote stretch of the German-Czech border. A mysterious visitor from Max’s darkest days shadows them. Everyone is suspect, including Harry’s lover, Sabine, and Munich detective Hartmut Dietz–both of whom have pledged to help. But before the Kaspar brothers can save the innocent victims of peace, grave secrets and the deep contempt sown during the war threaten to damn them all.
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I read this book before I read the first 2 in the series. I read it again after
reading the other 2. It was a good stand alone book, but the first 2 gave
me a better understanding. I gave it 5 stars after the first reading. I would
have given it more after the second. I wasn’t taught any of this in High
School History Class. I was 9 when the war ended. My dad had some of
the German Prisoners help with the fall harvesting of celery. It was against
the rules to feed them, but my mom did it anyway.
You should write on those POWs. You would do a great job!
Gale Jameson
This book illuminates an unfortunate consequence of the US/British alliance with the Soviet Union to end the war: thousands of Russians (White Russians, Cossacks and others) who opposed Stalin and had fled to Germany during the war were forcibly repatriated to the Soviet Union after the war and murdered by the Soviets once they were turned over by the US and Britain. Though slow moving at first, the author uses a clever plot involving brothers to move the story and expose this tragedy.
My review is probably biased because I added Audible narration and didn’t like the reader. I learn a lot from historical novels. I always follow novels like this by researching the facts on Google sources. I am appalled by what was agreed to at Yalta. We should be ashamed. Complex, interesting story.
A tail of a lesser known tragedy of WW II. Well told and goood character development.
I just couldn’t get interested in this book. I usually love this type of book, but not this one.
I liked it because I’m European and could relate realizing it was not far from the truth. Good read!