A Life Lived Well: Romance and Survival in Nazi Germany

Spycraft is the second-oldest profession, surpassed only by prostitution: confidential, classified, clandestine, covert, and concealed with intrigue and deception. The diverse world of spies reveals the depth and breadth of espionage, offering a glimpse into the rich landscape of intelligence operations and its unique characteristics, as well as a hint at the shadowy, captivating realm of strategy, schemes, and secrets that challenge the conscience. Nazi Germany provides fascinating espionage tales. This historical novel captures the imagination with a touch of literary license, yet remains true to real persons, agencies, events, and chronology, presenting a sophisticated and intelligent protagonist-a cunning Abwehr agent who undermined the Nazi regime even as he ran from it with a price on his head and was wanted by the SS for rescuing a Jewish beauty from a ghetto labor camp directly under the eyes of the SS commandant with a letter bearing Hitler’s forged signature. Fleeing led to the Ardennes and joining an underground resistance group to ambush Nazi rail convoys before fleeing to the smallest Channel island for refuge. This former pariah in police internal affairs, police chief, and professor, once tasting the scourge of the SS whip wielded by a stubborn, relentless enemy, was destined to return as police chief and professor in Heidelberg. Then, the Chancellor persuaded him to take a leave of absence as a federal criminal police investigator to locate and apprehend SS officers involved with three death camps. His tale is one of intrigue, romance, and survival, delving into the folly of the Faustian bargain, embracing Darwinian survival and Nietzschean Übermensch, and revealing the ultimate evil embedded in the Nazi psyche, juxtaposed with the meaning of true faith, the casuistry of conscience, and what matters in life. (Eight reviews inside)