Hart's War

Rating:
Summary: Great Book
Review: This book shows a lot of effort on the side of the author to capture the feel, sounds, and smells of an American POW camp during W.W.II. Even though the story is sometimes predictable, it is still a wonderful read.

I enjoyed it, and for the last 100 pages could not put the book down.

Rating:
Summary: Gripping read, but flawed in details
Review: An excellent story - gripping and hard to put down right enough. But irrating in its faulty or non-existant reseach - Spitfires had eight wing mounted .303 machine guns, NOT eight .50 calibers as Hauptmann Visser says. The disciplinary code for the U.S Army in 1943 was The Articles Of War, NOT the Uniform Code of Military Conduct the author refers to. There were a number of other avoidable inaccuracies, and encountering these always interrupted the rythm of the story, and diminished my overall enjoyment. As for making a movie of it - we all know Hollywood will screw it up!

Rating:
Summary: This One Will Make A Great Movie
Review: A terrific story with well-developed characters and a powerful conclusion, Hart's War is historical fiction at its best. Katzebach's page-turner is spell-binding and caught me in its grip from the get-go.

One thing is for certain: Hart's War will make a great movie and I am looking forward to seeing it!

Rating:
Summary: Not my typical reading material.....
Review: I signed up with Amazon for my "type" of reading material and wasn't quite sure why this title appeared on my "wish list". However, after reading the synopsis, I decided it was worth a try... the story line intrigued me. I enjoyed it fully and have already loaned it out to a male friend who stated, "Can't say I can see you reading this book" - a wee bit chauvinistic - but will let that pass. It is a two-gender book that is easy to read, makes you want to find out "who done it" and may make you shed a tear or two at the end.

Rating:
Summary: Fantastic, Could Not Put It Down
Review: This was a fantastic read. One of those books that once you start, you don't want to put it down until you are fininshed. What makes this story so fantastic is that the author drew on the experiences of his father when he was a German POW. The realism shines thru. While I made a lucky guess on who the guilty party was and even cheated and looked at the end to see if I was right, I still stayed up until 4:00 AM reading until I finished. I have not read any of the author's other books, but if they are 1/2 as good as Hart's War, I will need to add John Katzenbach to my must read authors list. If you want to curl up some night and read a truly entertaining tale, get Hart's War.

Rating:
Summary: It was great!
Review: I just finished this book this afternoon and enjoyed it thoroughly. It made me appreciate even more, our POW's and what their lives must be like.

Rating:
Summary: good light summer reading
Review: Katzenbach has produced a good WW II adventure with an intriguing legal mystery, the solution to which I missed, though all the clues were there! On the negative side, the narrator tended to be a bit "preachy." I prefer novels that let me draw my own conclusions without hitting me over the head with the moral of the story. Incidentally, I quite agree with the reviewer below who found echoes of Hogan's Heroes in the novel. Katzenbach's father was in fact a prisoner in Stalag 3, I understand, but that's changed to Stalag 13 in the novel. In addition, we have a spit-and-polish Commandant, a nosy and obnoxious Gestapo officer, and a German enlisted man who knows more of what's going on than he is willing to say ("I know nothing, nothing.") Pretty strange!

Rating:
Summary: One of the best books I've read in ages
Review: I've just finished reading the 490 pages of this book and wish it were twice as many pages. The characters are real, the story totally engrossing. There were no "extra" words in this story, never a flowery paragraph I was tempted to skip to get to the next meaty part. I wanted to read every single word. Even though, of course, the story builds to a crescendo, every chapter is exciting as part of a wonderful story.

Rating:
Summary: A Wonderful Read!
Review: I am a company commander in the US Army and my wife recently purchased this book because she knows of my fascination with military history. I must confess, I normally read non-fiction accounts because I find them thoroughly more fascinating and compelling than any fiction can provide. However, my wife took the time and effort to get this book after I briefly mentioned seeing it advertised here on Amazon so I figured I ought to read it. I am currently in the middle of a training exercise in Louisiana in preparation for my unit's rotation to Bosnia and our peacekeeping efforts there. We have very little contact with the outside populace and are surrounded by guards, towers, wire and lights. Very eerie when reading this book. Of course, the situation we are in is by choice, but the story is much more relevant and fascinating when read inside a prison-style environment surrounded by soldiers and sweltering conditions and apportioned food and away from loved ones. I have found placing oneself in as close to the context of a book as possible brings to life more nuances from the author than would otherwise be noticed when reading in a comfortable armchair or in bed. Further, context can also reveal the nuances missed by the author. Mr. Katzenbach has not missed any. In fact he describes more touching moments of the human condition than I thought possible. There are enough wonderful synopses of this book so I would like to comment on what I felt enlightened upon. First, above and beyond anything having to do with the military or law or war, this book dealt with the human condition of American and German men in WWII as a reflection of the society they sprouted from. Namely, how we as human beings view and, more importantly, treat each other. When all is said and done, Mr. Katzenbach reminds us of a time not very long away and not very far away of prejudice, segregation, and misguided hatred. I guess this seems more poignant to me as I am headed to a region of the world that has seen more than its share of such inhumanity. Mr. Katzenbach does a wonderful job in not fully resolving these problems. To have done so would be a disservice to our actual societal conditions and weaken his story. Bravo! Second, this book is a fantastic story of relationships. It captures the essential personal and interpersonal spirit of each and every character. Most fiction focuses on one or two antagonists or protagonists or simply glosses over everyone else. A good story is about personalities, not technology, not the law, not the military...personalities. Again Mr. Katzenbach, Bravo! Finally, this is in the end a fictional story and is bleimished with having to manufacture phrases and situations and will make a great movie. If the right actors and director are selected I will look forward to watching it, if not...well, Mr. Katzenbach what a wonderful read!

Rating:
Summary: An impossible to put down thriller
Review: An edge of the seat page turner that from the first encompasses a wide range of human emotions and behavior. Who exactly is the enemy here, the Germans or the prisoners themselves? The plot kept getting better and better. I enjoyed his characterizations and the story's twists and turns. An excellent read.