by Catherine Hokin
Publisher: Bookouture
Pages: 320
Format: eARC
Buy the Book: Amazon
Goodreads: 1933, Berlin. Ten-year-old Hanni Foss stands by her father’s side watching the torchlit procession to celebrate Adolf Hitler as Germany’s new leader. As the lights fade, she knows her safe and happy childhood is about to change forever. Practically overnight, the father she adores becomes unrecognisable, lost to his ruthless ambition to oversee an infamous concentration camp…
Twelve years later. As the Nazi regime crumbles, Hanni hides on the fringes of Berlin society in the small lodging house she’s been living in since running away from her father’s home. In stolen moments, she develops the photographs she took to record the atrocities in the camp – the empty food bowls and hungry eyes – and vows to get some measure of justice for the innocent people she couldn’t help as a child.
But on the day she plans to deliver these damning photographs to the Allies, Hanni comes face to face with her father again. Reiner Foss is now working with the British forces, his past safely hidden behind a new identity, and he makes it clear that he will go to deadly lengths to protect his secret. In that moment Hanni hatches a dangerous plan to bring her father down, but how far she is willing to go for revenge? And at what cost?
Kritters Thoughts: The book begins before World War II has begun and Hanni is excited for the parade that will be happening in Berlin celebrating Adolf Hitler as he is coming into power. Her father will become a leader in Hitler's regime and Hanni will see the inside of what that all entails.
As the story skips years, the reader doesn't have to see too much of the horrible truth that happened in Germany, but instead the reader gets to experience how hard it is to hold people to account for what they did during the war. This was what I loved about this book as there are few books that I have read that take place after World War II and talk about bringing justice to those who caused harm to innocent people during the war.
It was fun to have a mystery in the middle of a historical fiction. That happens, but not often and I enjoyed watching Hanni and Freddy track down the vigilante and tackle their feelings about what he was doing.
This book would be a great companion to The German Wife by Debbie Rix that I reviewed here. If you haven't read either, I would read The German Wife first and then read this one, they fit so well together.
Rating: definitely a good read, but can't read two in a row
Ebook 2022 Challenge: 3 out of 100
Disclosure of Material Connection: I received one copy of this book free of charge from Bookouture. I was not required to write a positive review in exchange for receipt of the book; rather, the opinions expressed in this review are my own.
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