Fox on the Rhine

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View books by Douglas Niles, Michael Dobson.

Ill-informed tripe! - Rated
It constantly amazes me that books such as this are allowed to be published. The author seems to have taken a few characters from high-school history lessons and welded them together in a mish-mash of action movie wafer-thin plot less nonsense. "I need a German general... err... Rommel - he'll do! I recognise him!" This would be the same Rommel who was arrested and detained over his supposed involvement with the anti-Hitler plotters? Himmler making peace with the untermensch Russian soviet despots he despised over almost all else? In reality (?) Himmler would have been more likely to make peace with the western allies to fight the soviets as he attempted to do in the last days of the war before committing suicide. There are several Nazi or SS generals the author could have picked if he had done even the most rudimentary research - Guderian springs to mind. As for the German mass production of Me262 fighter jets, if the Germans had had the resources to build Me262 on mass scale then logic follows they would have. The production of something as complicated as a jet engine in 1944 involves certain materials and procedures that aren't necessarily made available just by stopping production of other items.
All in all it seems to be poorly researched, badly written (I won't even mention the poor characterisation covered by other reviews) and simply a childish twisting of history to suit the author's means. The worst kind of alternative history. One star for the fact it got published.

a different battle of the bulge - Rated
In 1944, germans plotting to kill hitler left a bomb in his headquarters. Circumstances contrived to let him escape with just minor wounds. And the plotters were caught and killed. But what if they had succeeded in killing him?

An interesting start for an alternative history novel. What happens next is that himmler seizes power and takes a few steps he sees necessary to protect germany from a two front war. And thus the western allies are suddenly facing a different campaign from the one that we know.

A very good read. The prose is engrossing, the characterisation pretty good, and the battle scenes really grip. I got throughly engrossed in this book, and I shall definitely pick up the sequel.

good start but no depth or breadth - Rated
It starts off well, Hitler dies etc etc...but if you like alternate history there's much better out there. The genre by definition lends itself to subjective specualtion and views......fine......but this book is less about WWII and reads more like a US/German conflict, I might be wrong but I thought the British were also involved, and not just an off-shore staging point for the American forces. The characterisation is also wafer thin....particularly regarding Himmler I think. All in all in my opinion not that good, so 2 stars.
If you want something better try the Third Reich Victorious, Moscow Options or the Hitler Options

Second Part of my Review - Rated
As I expect I have said previously, I am a great fan of alternate history, with particular emphasis on the Second World War and the American Civil War, and The Fox on the Rhine appeared to be a good book about a subject that i have oftne wondered about (And read about). What would have happened...if Hitler had been killed by the bomb plot in 1944- how would history have changed?

Although the writing on the back cover was sparse, it got my interest. Rommel fighting Patton in the Battle of the Bulge...A Peace with Russia...the mass production of the ME262, the fighter plane that could have won Germany the war. It sounded too good to be true, especially as it was in a form of a novel and not an essay form.

I will say that i have not bee too disappointed by the book. The facts appear to be correct, down to the writers creating an entire fictional army division, and the do seem to have got the personalities down to a 't'. The action is fast-paced and exciting, with enough basis in history to make it more than credible, down to the way in which the SS sieze power from the plotters. In most ways it is a good book.

The reason that it did not get 5 stars is because of what i believe to be slightly unreal historical facts. (Warning- Spoilers).Would Stalin really have made a peace with a Germany that he was on the verge of defeating, and would the Germans have given away so much of their territory to an enemy that would make good use of it? I found these questions slightly disturbing in an otherwise good book, as i also found some of the characters to be unusual. A pilot who carries a whip around in his briefcase and uses it to whip slave prisoners was something that i find a little too stereotypical and melodramatic for a book based on such firm historical ground. Would Rommel have surrendered so easily... and would the Alliesd have risked WW3 by fighting the Russians, as the plot of their next book goes?

Still, apart from a few odd historical facts and a tendency for melodrama, it is a very good book and worth buying.

Brilliant, Detailed Alternate History - Rated
I am a huge fan of all kinds of alternate history, as well as WWII, so imagine my surprise when i picked up this book in America. This is possibly one of the best alternate history books i have ever read, although a few points are unusual.

The plot is cunningly simple. By changing one small fact, (Hitler is killed by the briefcase bomb in 1944), the authors open up a whole world of alternate fiction. The plotters kill Hitler, but are themselves taken over by Himmler in a power plot to take over the entire Third Reich. The action is brilliantly detailed and seems to be historically accurate, down to the weapons used by the combatants, and the book shows what would have happened if Hitler had died. The ME 262's are used as fighters instead of bombers, changing the superiority.

A good book