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"I've always been fascinated by her ability to tell a story . . . Rusch has style." --Charles de Lint, author, "The Onion Girl"
Product Description
This much is true: Hitler was obsessed with his young niece, Geli Raubal. On 19th September, 1931, two years before he came to power, Geli was found dead of a gunshot wound in Hitler's apartment in an exclusive area of Munich. Her death was ruled a suicide, but the suspicion of murder remained long after she had been laid to rest. In 1971, Annie Pohlmann, a young American student, arrives in Germany to interview retired detective Fritz Stecher, who headed the original investigation. She gets more than she bargained for when Stecher reveals the whole story of a case that not only nearly kills him, but almost changed the course of history.
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
In 1972, Annie Pohlman, a criminology student, travels to Munich to interview the legendary German homicide detective of the 1930's, Fritz Stecher, who desperately needs to tell someone about the case of Geli Raubal. In 1931, Geli is found dead in Hitler's apartment. The official ruling is suicide. Since Hitler is only one of several competing politicians trying to rise to the top and Fritz's superiors loathe the Nazi, they assign him to quietly investigate the murder.
Almost immediately, Fritz decides that circumstantial evidence points towards murder, probably arranged or even done by Hitler. As Fritz gets closer to learning the truth, he finds his own life in danger from Hitler's Brown Shirts, who want the investigation stopped so that their leader's rising political power does not abruptly crumble. Fritz also has problems with the government, especially with the Ministry of Justice. If Fritz is to successfully complete his most difficult case, he will have to proceed with great caution and incredible speed.
The premise behind HITLER'S ANGEL is quite clever (a real case from the 1930's) and the use of flashbacks works exceedingly well. Fritz, who tells the entire story, is a great senior citizen, who seems grandfatherly and wise. However, Annie is not well-developed and Fritz's apartment seems lacking as a backdrop with Munich preparing for the Olympics just outside the building. Kris Rusch shows her highly regarded fantasy story telling ability easily crosses genres into the historical mystery realm, but what could have been a classic falls a bit short. Still, this very good book is worth reading by fans of the writer and readers of historical mysteries.
Harriet Klausner.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Hitler had a perverted obsession for his half niece Geli Raubal who was found dead in mysterious circumstances on 19 September 1931 when her body was spirited away and recorded as suicide. This occurred at a critical time as Hitler was consolidating his position prior to upcoming elections.
The novel is a fictional investigation into Geli's death by the Criminal Police, and set in 1972 with the aging fictional investigator Fritz Stecher answering questions from Student Annie Pohlmann. There are two separate strands, the novel about the investigation, and the interplay between Stecher and Pohlmann in italics providing an historical perspective on the events.
The novel is intriguing for someone like me who is familiar with the life of Geli Raubal and the crucial period in Hitler's assumption of power. However it gives virtually no details of the frequently conflicting accounts of Geli's life, appearance and pesonality, and this is a serious omission. Therefore for those interested in filling in the blanks I suggest the following:
GELI AND HITLER by Ronald Hayman - an excellent historic account of the relationship and the mystery surrounding Geli's death. Includes many photographs of Geli.
UNCLE ADOLPH - fine film covering the relationship and Geli's life.
HITLER THE RISE OF EVIL - excellent mini series covering the period in Hitler's life prior to him assuming power, includes the Geli relationship.
The novel is a fictional investigation into Geli's death by the Criminal Police, and set in 1972 with the aging fictional investigator Fritz Stecher answering questions from Student Annie Pohlmann. There are two separate strands, the novel about the investigation, and the interplay between Stecher and Pohlmann in italics providing an historical perspective on the events.
The novel is intriguing for someone like me who is familiar with the life of Geli Raubal and the crucial period in Hitler's assumption of power. However it gives virtually no details of the frequently conflicting accounts of Geli's life, appearance and pesonality, and this is a serious omission. Therefore for those interested in filling in the blanks I suggest the following:
GELI AND HITLER by Ronald Hayman - an excellent historic account of the relationship and the mystery surrounding Geli's death. Includes many photographs of Geli.
UNCLE ADOLPH - fine film covering the relationship and Geli's life.
HITLER THE RISE OF EVIL - excellent mini series covering the period in Hitler's life prior to him assuming power, includes the Geli relationship.
5 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
I have some problems with this book..the ending revelations about Fritz's past, the judgements of Fritz on the American character are not inaccurate, but a bit repetitive, and the "hitler in all of us" idea is dabatable, and will be debated for a long time. But this novel does succeed in several ways, particularly in showing how devasted the world of the German was after WWI, and it depicts well the political labyrinth of german society before Hitler actually took full power in 1933. The story was engrossing and intelligent, the world depicted is complex and interesting. There were many times and ways Hitler could have been stoped by the Germans, the plain and tragic fact was that he was not stopped until 50 million people had died violent deaths as a result of the german people following him. As insane or not as Hitler may have been, he did not effect the Holocaust or unleash history's bloodiest war by himself...millions and millions of Germans willingly followed him into this moral hell, and millions more in Europe and even for a time, America, acquiesed in the horror. We, after all, bombed Dresden weeks before the war's end, killing a hundred thousand civilians when we could have been bombing the rail lines to the camps. One great success of this book is that it does not avoid the moral ambiguities of the time. Worth reading.
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