Hart's War: A Novel of Suspense

by John Katzenbach

Book Overview

Year after year the novels of John Katzenbach have earned acclaim from across the country. "Mesmerizing" announces The New York Times . . . "gripping" trumpets The Washington Post Book World . . .... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Mass Market Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0345426258
• Release Date: August 2000
• Publisher: Ballantine Books
• Length: 576 Pages
• Weight: 0.60 lbs.
• Dimensions: 6.8" x 1.5" x 4.1"

Customer Reviews

a few good men and a few bad ones, too

At a POW camp for Allied airmen, a prisoner is murdered. Suspicion immediately falls on Lincoln Scott, the only black man in the camp and a target for the dead man's racism. Bomber navigator and law student Tommy Hart is ordered to defend Scott in what is clearly going to be little more than a polite form of lynching. But as Hart begins his investigations, he soon realises that nothing in the camp is what it seems...This is a superb twist on the legal-thriller genre, the twist being of course that all the protagonists are captives. By confining himself to such a restricted world, Katzenbach must rely on storytelling ability - there's no chance for sex scenes, chase scenes, or various other stock distractions. He succeeds admirably; it's been a while since I read a story with such good pacing and tension. (Conversely, the Stalag environment means that other typical genre things such as characters creeping round in the dead of night to find evidence make a lot more sense).What lifts Hart's War further above the genre are the characters and the tensions between them: while the basic theme is concerned with racism, little else could be considered black-and-white. Most intriguing are the Germans, who may be The Enemy but aren't necessarily the "bad guys". There are several sides playing off each other, and much of the intrigue (and entertainment) comes from trying to decide who gains from what. Topping it all off are some honest musings on heroism and courage.

A superb thriller and a sensitive reflection on the war.

This is certainly Katzenbach's best. He provides us with a highly original setting for a legal thriller and he certainly delivers on the courtroom drama. This alone should be enough for a good and enjoyable read. The book is, however, much more. It is exciting in creating the atmosphere of a camp of officers in the war with all its desparation, petty fights and daily boredom amidst a very explosive and for the inmates generally dangerous environment.Than God, Katzenbach does not go for a black and white description of the Allies and the Germans; there are very bad characters among the inmates and there is some good old European ethics left in some of the Germans . It is quite clear that some of those (Fritz e.g.) faced a "prisonors dilemma" as often as the real inmates.In this Katzenbach provides us not only with an exciting thriller but also makes us pause and reflect on human behavior in this most adverse of circumstances; a POW camp.I can't wait to see the movie.

A supremely satisfying story of many facets

At first look, the basic plot of HART'S WAR is nothing extraordinary. A black man is framed by a racist populace for the murder of an ostensibly popular white man. And, of course, a novice lawyer, with zero experience in capital murder cases, is assigned as defense counsel for the trial. Ho-hum. The premise is so threadbare that I normally wouldn't have read beyond the jacket. But, hang on a minute ...In this multi-faceted thriller by John Katzenbach, the place is Stalag Luft 13, a Luftwaffe prison camp for allied flyers shot down in WWII. The accused, Lincoln Scott, is a fictional black pilot of the real-life, famed 332nd Fighter Group (the Tuskegee Airmen), who was downed while heroically defending a crippled B-17 bomber. He's the only Negro prisoner in the camp, and a aloof loner by choice because, you understand, he distrusts whites. The victim, Trader Vic, is a respected bomber pilot from Mississippi that had become the stalag's expert trader in forbidden goods. Lt. Tommy Hart, the navigator of a downed B-25, stands for the defense. Tommy, who left law school to join the Army Air Corps, has essentially finished his law studies while as a POW by reading every legal text he can lay his hands on. The Senior American Officer, Col. MacNamara, and the camp commandant, Luftwaffe Oberst Von Reiter, only want to get Scott's court-martial wrapped up quickly without undue embarrassment to either the Americans or the Germans. This novel unfolds on many levels. It is, of course, a courtroom drama. But it's also a war drama, a detective drama, a prison drama, and an escape drama. Young Hart is clearly the reluctant, white-hatted good guy, but the moral and ethical issues revealed as he squares off against the rest of the camp remain elusively gray. Who, for instance, is the most evil, black-hatted bad guy? Even the battle-maimed and bitter camp adjutant, Hauptmann Visser, is a man possessing a certain honor, and doing his duty as he perceives it. And, when the identity and motive of the real killer are uncovered, would you, the reader, condemn and convict? This is a question that Tommy himself must ultimately answer as his personality is hammered to maturity in the forge of "growing up".I liked this book very much, finishing it over a 4-day business trip to DC. I especially liked the irony presented by the 84 hats, an "in-your-face" consequence thrust into Tommy's consciousness, the unforeseen result of a decision he, essentially a non-violent person, had to make to survive.

More than a mystery, this is a phenomenal book

John Katzenbach's latest is a bit of a departure. Set in a POW camp during WWII, it combines incredible drama with timeless lessons about race, duty, and honor. The characters are unforgettable, this is a classic in the vein of To Kill a Mockingbird. The best book I've read in a while.