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David John
Harper
July 10, 2012 / ISBN 9780062091567
Fiction / Thrillers
Amazon
Reviewed
by Linda Morelli
Richard Denham is a hard boiled English reporter living in Berlin
in 1936 who does not hesitate to report the sinister aspects of
Nazism for his English language readers. Against the backdrop of
the 1936 Olympics, breakout author David John weaves a tale of political
intrigue and suspense that takes place in Nazi Germany, Great Britain
and America. David deftly mixes real historical characters (he provides
brief bios at the end of his novel) that interact with his fictional
characters to recreate the climate of Nazi Germany on the verge
of claiming its place on the world stage through the Olympics.
Joining Richard is a female American Olympic star (Eleanor) who
has come to Berlin to compete but is thrown off the team while in
transit for violating curfew. Although at first indifferent to the
swirl of politics surrounding the Olympics, Eleanor joins Richard
as he gets drawn into spy-versus-spy intrigue between the British
and Germans involving a dossier that both the Nazis and British
want. Is Richard a reporter or a spy? Why does Richard want to help
a Jewish family escape Nazi Germany? The deeper Eleanor gets drawn
into this intrigue, the more she believes Richard's staunch anti-Nazi
views.
The author weaves a tale of intrigue while describing how Nazi Germany
officials used the Olympics to further Germany's goals to become
a dominant world power. The reader is quickly drawn into the dark
world of Nazi Germany secret police before the start of WWII that
is seldom told these days. The plot's twists and turns certainly
kept me intrigued, but I really liked the believability of the interaction
of the fictional characters with real historical figures, and the
exciting climax on the fateful journey of the Nazi airship Hindenburg
that crashed in New Jersey in 1937.
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