In the Presence of Mine Enemies - Hardcover

Turtledove, Harry

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0451529022 ISBN 13: 9780451529022

Publisher: NAL Hardcover, 2003

Synopsis

In the twenty-first century, Germany's Third Reich continues to thrive after its victory in World War II-keeping most of Europe and North America under its heel.

But within the heart of the Nazi regime, a secret lives. Under a perfect Aryan facade, Jews survive-living their lives, raising their families, and trying to avoid discovery.

About this title

About the Author

Harry Turtledove—the New York Times bestselling author of numerous alternate history novels, including The Guns of the South, How Few Remain, and the Worldwar quartet—has a Ph.D. in Byzantine history. Nominated numerous times for the Nebula Award, he has won the Hugo, Sidewise, and John Esthen Cook Awards. He lives with his wife and children in California.

From Publishers Weekly

Despite its intriguing alternative premise, Turtledove's lengthy tale of Berlin's Jews hiding in the open long after the Nazis defeated all their WWII enemies plods along in a series of vignettes told from the viewpoints of six different Jewish characters passing as "good Germans": Wehrmacht analyst Heinrich Gimpel, his wife, Lise, and their precocious 10-year-old daughter, Alicia; medieval English scholar Susanna Weiss; and physician's receptionist Esther Stutzman and her husband, Walther, whose computer expertise has helped many Berlin Jews shed their "unclean" ancestry. But as the Gimpels and their friends struggle to keep their secret culture alive, all around them chinks are appearing in the very foundations of the Reich, starting with the death of Hitler's second successor and the selection of a progressive new Fuhrer. Tepid characterizations, clumsy plot devices, interminable bridge sessions between the Gimpels and their Aryan friends, even some dialogue seemingly better suited to a drawling John Wayne than a Wehrmacht panzer commander (who defies the SS with "you're going to be mighty sorry"), all dilute the author's message of hope for these downtrodden remnants of the Chosen People. Closing on a curiously inconclusive note-or is it a lead-in to an equally ponderous sequel?-this account of an unlikely political thaw dribbles off into a puddle of cliches, sentiment and unconvincing coincidence.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: NAL Hardcover
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 0451529022
• ISBN 13: 9780451529022
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 464