Customer Reviews

Night of the Generals

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4 star:		(2)
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2 star:		(1)
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It seems like such a natural marriage - the corrupt and criminal Nazi regime with the classic fictional detective devoted to justice - that's it's surprising that so few writers have merged setting with theme. Among the top rank of mystery writers today, only Phillip Kerr, channelling Raymond Chandler and J. Robert Janes, inspired by Rex Stout, are in print.

But long before Bernie Gunther and St-Cyr and Kohler, there were Hans Helmut Kirst's Lt. Colonel Grau and Inspector Prevert, and great as Kerr and Janes are, there is no competition.

When a horrible murder is committed in Warsaw, Col. Grau, and, later, Inspector Prevert doggedly pursue the guilty party. It is one of three Wehrmacht Generals and long before the guilty party is revealed about half way through the book, anyone paying attention will have figured out who's guilty.

But that isn't the point of the novel. First of all, Kirst has bigger fish to fry. He has something to say about the role of a general in society. This is one of those rare anti-war books for grown up minds, but it is not anti-military. The author, one of whose great stylistic devices is to insert documents into the text to add verisimilitude and to include his own theory of duty and honor without disrupting the flow of the story, has a short excerpt at the end of the book on the special duty of generals in society which should be required reading at the Command and General Staff School.

But Kirst was always a great novelist in addition to a philosopher and the real delight in this novel is to watch Prevert set the trap which captures the guilty party (while acting as Cupid on the side). The last 80 or so pages are like a symphony in prose: so many pieces come together so seamlessly that it is one of the great memorable passages in detective fiction.

Hans Helmut Kirst was a great comic author, whose humor is so dark that he shows up Joseph Heller as the juvenile vaudvillean he was. Night of the Generals combines the genres of dark satire, gripping mystery and thoughtful political philosophy.

Why does one have to buy this great work used? By the way, there is a great movie which was made from the book, but it is only a pale shadow of this fine book.

AN EXCELLENT CRIME THILLER WHICH FOR A LONG TIME REFUSES TO LEAVE YOUR THOUGHTS.A FIRST RATE MOVIE OF THE SAME NAME WAS MADE A FEW DECADES BACK.THE BOOK GRIPS YOU FROM THE BEGINING AND THE READER ASKS FOR MORE OF THE SAME.THE WRITER HAS EXCELLENT UNDERSTANDING OF MILITARY ADMINISTRATION SPECIALLY WHEN IT HAS TO PASS THROUGU THE TURBULANCE AND STRESS & STRAINS OF WAR.

Gabler, Kahlenberge, Tanz. A cold blood trail from Warsaw to Paris, and later on back to Fatherland. The inner demons eclipse the surreal nightmare that created them.

Whenever I enjoy a movie based on a successful book, I am excited to give the original a read. It's usually better! PRINCE OF TIDES...OF HUMAN BONDAGES...and many others.

Unfortunately, that wasn't the case for me with this one. Especially as a fan of historical fiction, I'd been looking forward to an engrossing thriller but I was tremendously disappointed. It just couldn't hold my attention.

I suspect this is a case where it would have been better to read the book first!

Would someone please explain to Mr. Asiner that the point of a review is to give one's opinion as to whether or not the book is good; not to give away ever single bit of the plot, including the ending! No reason to buy this book now after reading his "review". I bet the author and publisher are happy about that.

I am am currently reading the novel. I came to the review section to see what others were saying. the FIRST review I read gives away the ENTIRE plot line. Thanks for ruining a good book.

The Second World War has produced many different kinds of novels, but the detective novel has not often been the case. In NIGHT OF THE GENERALS, Hans Hellmut Kirst tells of a German general who uses his position to kill women as if he were a Teutonic Jack the Ripper. The problem with writing a murder mystery using the deaths of millions as a backdrop is that the reader is forced to face an unsettling question: what is the value of one human life taken in murder when millions more are taken during battle?
General Tanz is the Nazi general who likes to slice up [hookers]. After he commits a few murders, one police officer, Major Grau, begins to suspect him, but lacks the proof needed to accuse a general. When Grau does get the proof, Tanz has him arrested and executed. All this detective work takes place before and after the plot on Hitler's life in 1944. Tanz survives the war only to continue his killing in the Soviet bloc countries. Another policeman, a friend of Grau's, picks up the chase, and brings with him a witness to Tanz's murders. Faced with the publicity of being accused a serial killer, the general commits suicide.
This book is the classic cat-and-mouse novel, with the suspect revealed from the very first chapter. The power of the book lies in whether the general or the police will triumph. However, it is unavoidable to consider how one life figures into the bigger scheme of things while a world war is raging. Concepts such as truth, justice, personal responsibility, and accountability form the philosophical underpinning. By the time, the reader gets to the end, he can see that the death of one woman still counts for something even while mass craziness is being perpetrated on millions of others.