Inside Nuremberg Prison [Kindle Edition]

I first heard of this book from an article the BBC published in September 2011. I thought this story would be written in mostly first person, from Howard Triest's point of view. I was expecting a physical, published book. I was expecting it to be wonderfully well written. Alas...

I want to say, now, in case you don't read the rest, that the material here is wonderful and that I would still buy the book, now, if I had the option to do it over.

I sincerely wish that was had been written in first person from Howard. Putting this almost entirely in third person gives it a very detached feel and really leaves the reader wondering how much of this Howard said and how much of it is the writer extrapolating from some basic knowledge.

To Howard Triest: Thank you so much for taking part in such an important and crucial event to our world history. Your information is highly valued and, for me, something to be cherished. I do wish that you had been able to choose a different writer for this book, a different format, or even just a better editor who could catch punctuation errors. I wish it had truly been written in your voice because it could have been such a powerful, involved testimony to such privileged meetings. I think your story has the potential to be one of the greatest and most fascinating of all the WW2, Third Reich, and/or the Nuremberg trials.

Howard Triest may very well have been the most perfect translator for his American and British authorities at Nuremberg. His name did not "sound" Jewish. He absolutely did not "look Jewish." He was the epitome of a "proper Aryan," a "proper German," with his blonde hair and blue eyes. This helped him gain favor with some of the most notorious names from Hitler's Reich because they thought he was like them. They had no idea their translator was Jewish and that he had sought refuge in the US. Sadly, even until the day they each died, none of them knew that he was Jewish. None of them were made to face their misguided belief that someone could look Jewish. I wonder if, had they been told, even on their last day of life, of his roots, if the interrogators could have learned more about those men by watching them grapple with truth, with reality, with the possible realization that everything they believe in and would die for, was a farce.

All in all, buy the book. It is history that you can't get elsewhere. The mediocre writer is a drawback, but the material is gold.

This book reads like several different versions of the same book proposal were stapled together and left in a folder somewhere with the transcript of notes from an interview with the protagonist. The subject of this book deserved a far better writer. There is a huge story here, but we never really get to hear it. I'm not sure if the author might have been limited in the details they were 'allowed' to write about or what (I'm grasping at straws, here..), but Ms. Fry misses HUGE opportunities for genuine gripping storytelling here. I feel like I was talked into visiting this prison with the author, and then got knocked over the head and dragged into my own cell there. Through the bars, I got occasional glimpses of important people being escorted past. Some even stopped for a few minutes and told me a couple of things I didn't know. But overall, I feel mugged. I read it for the detailed information it DID have, and you should do the same. I guess it was worth the $2.99 I paid for what I got out of it.

THE ACCOUNT OF THE PLACE THAT WOULD BECOME SO FAMOUS IN LATTER YEARS FOR NAZI WAR CRIMES TRIALS. MOST DON'T KNOW THAT THIS WAS A PRISON BEFORE THE FAMOUS TRIALS.