Hart's War (Paperback)

The first thing that former law student Tommy Hart does after his B-25 is shot down and he--the only survivor--is captured, is to fill out a form for the International Red Cross, telling his family he's alive and requesting, under "Special Items Needed," a copy of Edmund's Principles of Common Law. Amazingly, the book is waiting when he arrives at Stalag Luft Thirteen in the Bavarian woods. Hart soon puts it to good use, defending (with the help of two other prisoners, a former London barrister and a Canadian police detective) the prickly, proud Lieutenant Lincoln Scott when he is charged with killing a racist and corrupt fellow prisoner. The Nazis, especially a resident SS observer, have their own reasons for wanting the trial to be seen as a fair one, and it takes place against the backdrop of a planned mass escape. --Dick Adler --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review
The demands of honour and the price of heroism are the themes of Katzenbach's remarkable novel. Tommy Hart was shot down over Germany and is finding it hard to live with the fact that he is the only surviving member of his crew. As a POW at Stalag Luft 13, he waits for the war to end. But when a new prisoner arrives, a black pilot, intense hostility begins among the prisoners. The author renders his grim setting with maximum dramatic impact and never reverts to cliche. The characters are rich and multifaceted, allowing the reader to change their view of them several times (always the sign of an accomplished novelist). This is a truly powerful read. (Kirkus UK)

A courtroom drama with an interesting spin on "change of venue," the venue here being a German POW camp. Lieutenant Tommy Hart, sole survivor of a downed B-25, is spending his war in Stalag Luff 13. Like his fellow prisoners, Tommy is bedeviled by his keepers, debilitating homesickness, near starvation, and, perhaps worst of all, tedium. He counters the last by setting himself a major project: reading the law. A third-year student at Harvard when the war interrupted, Tommy's been tapping the Red Cross for books so that he can fill his educational gaps. Then an unsettling, even scary, thing happens. He finds himself thrust into a courtroom for real. More - he's first chair in a capital case. Still more - the defendant, his client, Lieutenant Lincoln Scott, appears to have been caught dead to rights. And even that doesn't fully cover it. For 1942, Lieutenant Scott is the wrong color - part of a pioneering wave of black fighter pilots, a color not popular at Stalag Luff 13. On the other hand, the man Scott's accused of murdering could have run for the Stalag presidency and won in a walk. Tommy quickly realizes that he's been placed in first chair mostly so that it can be pulled out from under him: Both he and his client have been set up. At first, their alliance is fragile; then it strengthens as they battle to expose liars and conspirators, in and out of the courtroom, whatever uniform they might wear. As usual with Katzenbach (State of Mind, 1997, etc.), there's just too much novel here, some of it pat and predictable besides. Intermixed, however, are scenes of considerable power, even a few of tenderness. On balance, maybe the author's best. (Kirkus Reviews)

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• Books > Crime, Thrillers & Mystery > Authors, A-Z > K > Katzenbach, John
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