The Death's Head Chess Club

Winner of the 2016 Waverton Good Read Award

Can you ever forgive the unforgivable?

In 1962, Emil Clément comes face to face with Paul Meissner at a chess tournament in Holland. They haven't seen one another in almost two decades. Clément, once known only as The Watchmaker, is a Jewish former inmate of Auschwitz. Whilst there, he was forced to play chess against Nazi guards. If he won, he could save a fellow prisoner's life; if he lost, he would lose his own. Meissner, a soft-spoken priest, was also at Auschwitz. He was the SS Officer who forced The Watchmaker to play...