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Title details for Diary of a Dead Man on Leave by David Downing - Available

Diary of a Dead Man on Leave

by David Downing
Paul Woodson
Audiobook
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From bestselling author David Downing, master of historical espionage, comes a heart-wrenching depiction of Germany in the days leading up to World War II and the difficult choices of one man of conviction. In April 1938, a man calling himself Josef Hofmann arrives at a boarding house in Hamm, Germany, and lets a room from the widow who owns it. Fifty years later, Walter Gersdorff, the widow's son, who was eleven years old in the spring of 1938, discovers the carefully hidden diary the boarder had kept during his stay, even though he should never have written any of its contents down. What Walter finds is a scathing chronicle of one the most tumultuous years in German history, narrated by a secret agent on a deadly mission. Josef Hofmann was not the returned Argentinian immigrant he'd said he was-he was a communist spy under Moscow's command to try to reconnect with any remnants of Germany's suppressed communist party. Hofmann's bosses believe the common workers are the only way to stop the German war machine from within. Posing as a railroad man, Hofmann sets out on his game of "Russian roulette," approaching Hamm's ex-party members one at a time and delicately feeling out their allegiances. He always knew his mission would most likely end in his death, and he was satisfied to make that sacrifice for the revolution if it could help stop Hitler and his abominable ideology. But as he grows close to the Gersdorffs, accidentally stepping into the role of the father Walter never had, Hofmann begins to wish for another kind of hope in his life.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    April 2, 2019

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Listen audiobook

      • ISBN: 9781980027034
      • File size: 282120 KB
      • Duration: 09:47:44

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • Publisher's Weekly

      Starred review from March 18, 2019
      Downing (the John Russell series) has never been better than in this moving and elegiac thriller framed as a diary written by a German calling himself Josef Hofmann. In April 1938, Hofmann returns to his native country on behalf of the Communist International organization. The leaders of the Communist Party want to know whether “there are still enough Communists in Germany brave or foolhardy enough to constitute a significant fifth column inside Hitler’s Reich.” Hofmann, a member of the Comintern’s International Liaison Section, is ridden with guilt over a lengthy list “of those I failed to help because I was too busy helping everyman.” In the town of Hamm, a former stronghold of the country’s Communist Party, Hofmann seeks to locate any survivors among 19 party members who worked there when the Nazis seized power and gauge their current loyalties while keeping his own hidden. Meanwhile, he becomes emotionally involved with the family in whose boarding house he’s staying, an entanglement that may compromise his assignment. Le Carré fans will be pleased. Agent: Charlie Viney, Viney Agency.

    • AudioFile Magazine
      Narrators Paul Woodson and David de Vries join together to create a suspenseful listening experience set against the backdrop of WWII. Woodson is the voice of Josef Hofmann, a clandestine Russian agent sent to keep the German communist party alive. De Vries is the much younger Walter Gersdorff, a man who remembers a strange house guest from his childhood. His voice is the frame for the story, beginning and ending it in a modern, brisk persona. Woodson is the ruminating, brooding Josef, whose story is told through the pages of his long-lost journal. He projects the sense of tension and danger that permeates Josef's mission to infiltrate the Nazi party from within. Fans of historical fiction will be riveted. M.R. © AudioFile 2019, Portland, Maine

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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