Like many writers, (I hope and pray to Yoda) I’m an intermittent writer. In snatches and grabs, I write pages at a time, (and ~sigh~ at times, a sentence or two at a time) amid loooooong stretches of nothing. In those long stretches I read. Fiction and politics, finance and poetry, cookbooks and comic books—I read it all.
Reading is the writers’ life blood. Without the works and words of others, we have nothing to aspire to. With nothing to emulate, we have nothing to become. And, without the occasional turkey, we have nothing to learn from.
When I first heard of Brad Meltzer and Josh Mensch's "The Nazi Conspiracy," the premise—a plot to assassinate the allied leaders—enthralled me. Even after hearing a historian's opinion that the book was more entertaining than historically accurate, I was undissuaded.
The good
There are a handful of really good character studies contained in the fast 335 pages. My reading on the Second World War is minimal. As a result, Meltzer/Mensch's accounts of the infighting within the Nazi Foreign Intelligence service, (SD) and more pointedly between SD chief Walter Schellenberg and Lt. Otto Skorenzy—complete with a desk out of a James Bond movie—is entertaining. No less so is the account of Skorenzy's mission to rescue Italian dictator, Benito Mussolini.
Equally, the delicate calculus that the three allies, President Franklin Roosevelt, British Priminister Winston Churchill, and Soviet Premier Joseph Stalen, used to align their pieces on a chessboard of friends and enemies is suspenseful.
The bad
Execution is where things bog down in Meltzer and Mensch's book. They have a habit of restating, indeed, reintroducing characters and conflicts. The previously mentioned "desk" scene would've been more riveting, (than entertaining) if M/M had simply trusted the reader to remember that Oberführer Walter Schellen had many enemies, foreign and domestic. Instead they rehash from 20 pages earlier.
"Mike Reilly is on another plane. He's been on a lot of them in the past two weeks, almost too many to count. He's also been on quite a few boats, trains, trucks and jeeps..."
But it's not just the restating. M/M's prose run to clunky and promote eye rolling (if not pained squinting) more than drama or tension. Lines like the one quoted above would embarrass a pulp author. Further, I struggled with the constant jump in tenses (past, present, who-knows).
The ugly
There really is no ugly here. The violence is reported, (when reported at all) in journalistic detachment. It's all quite benign with nothing explicit. The book is fine, not great, no terrible, just fine.
The benefit
Reading a mediocre book is not a wasted effort. Ideally, you see what works and what doesn’t. However the best way to really understand both, is to review the book. By dissecting the book, for the well done and the undone, you get a better idea of how and how-not to write your own story.
Another upside to a less-than-great story is the desire to find something that does work for you. As I write this I'm 220 pages into Jon Meacham's analysis of President Lincoln, And There was Light. Meacham also provided a cover blurb for The Nazi Conspiracy, so this is not a out-of-left-field comparison. More historian than dramatist, Meacham gets the first commandment of telling a story—any story—thou shalt not get in your story's way.
In their closing, Meltzer and Mensch note that there have been scarce attempts at telling this story and their aim was to write the definitive take on this event. They had an embarrassment of riches to work with. As a reader, I simply wish they had a more exacting editor.
The Nazi Conspiracy is a work of historical fiction, (my opinion) complete at 335 pages. Check it out, take notes, and get cracking on your own story.
Buona fortuna.
The photo at the top belongs to the author and is used by his very kind permission.
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