Recently, I read a novel titledNazi Hunters by Neal Bascomb which I found in Mr.Jockers’ library. Born in Colorado and raised in St.Louis, Neal Bascomb earned a double degree in English Literature and Economics at the Miami University in Ohio. He also spent several years in London, Paris and Dublin as a journalist. He is a New York Times bestselling author who has written numerous other books, and Neal published the book Nazi Hunters in 2013. I decided to read this book because I found the summary on the inside of the cover to be of interest and because I found the title to be quite eye catching. As a reader I like to learn about World War ll through books and this one proved to be very intriguing and interesting.

The book begins with a teenage girl named Sylvia Hermann and her boyfriend Nick Eichmann. One night when Sylvia invites Nick over to dinner at her house, and they get into conversation about the Holocaust, Nick poses a strange opinion declaring “the job should’ve been finished.” After being shocked by what Nick said Sylvia and her family realize that Nick is actually the son of a Nazi general, Adolf Eichmann, who was one of the major organizers for the Holocaust, responsible for the deaths of millions. This information sparks a lot of interest especially for the people looking to avenge loved ones in who died. The people who were most interested in this were the Israelis. They, like many others, are dedicated to finding Nazi generals that have gone into hiding and bringing them to trial for the crimes they have committed in front of the world. After others following the trail to Eichmann and coming up cold, a team of Israelis travel to Argentina with a plan to capture and bring Eichmann back to a trial in Israel. The only problem is that the Argentinian police protect people like Eichmann that have committed such crimes. The team is operating illegally in Argentina and if the officials find out they could be exposed, so the question is… will the team be able to get Eichmann to Israel without being caught?

This is a picture of Adolf Eichmann.
The point of view from which the story is told is third person. In most books that I have read, the narrative voice is usually from a main character, but in this case it is told from a narrator as such. This definitely impacts the story. For example, instead of getting an inside look at what thoughts are going through the characters heads, we get an overview of what they look like. If the story was told through one person then you would understand more of what the character was feeling and what they were thinking. This also impacts how the story is told. Since each person in the operation had different jobs they could all different opinions on what happened at a certain point in the plan. Instead, in third person we get an overview of what happened as if we were a ghost at the scenes. We can tell how a character looks and make a deduction of how they feel. Overall, we get a sense of the story, but not on a really deep level.

I really liked how throughout the book the author included many real pictures of the Israelis on the team hunting Eichmann down and of Eichmann and even of some of their supplies. To write the novel Neal Bascomb traveled to four continents interviewing Israel spies and finding information in libraries and archives. He interviewed individuals involved in the operation and even had help from a team of translators and researchers as help. This information made it all possible to write the book and also made it more enjoyable for readers to see all the actual people involved. I thought this was very cool and interesting.

I was interested in this passage on page 148, where it says, “Malkin remembered when he had watched Eichmann playing with his young son outside his home. ‘Your boy, he reminds me so much of my sister’s son.’ Malkin said.
‘What happened to him?’
‘Nothing happened.’ Malkin answered bitterly. But then he continued, ‘There is only one thing I know: Your boy is alive, and the boy of my sister is dead.’
Are you going to kill me?’ Eichmann asked.
‘No. We’re going to bring you to a trial, to a fair trial-a chance you never gave your victims.’”
I found this passage interesting because I wondered “why would the Israelis spend such a large amount of time and energy to not immediately kill their prisoner?” If they planned to bring a prisoner to your own country halfway across the world why would you not kill the war criminal? I also wondered is the Israelis were really going to give Eichmann a “fair trial” as they said they were going to. If your country was against the Holocaust and most people wanted this war criminal dead then wouldn’t the decision be baist? If you were going to go to all the trouble of capturing a criminal would you really rule for the criminal wasting all the time, effort and money? So is the trial really going to be fair?

I found this book really interesting and captivating, and anyone who likes to learn about World War ll with pictures and an interesting story would really enjoy this novel. For all the action and interesting knowledge I gained from this book I would rate it a 10 out of 10. I definitely anyone to read this book. (Even better, you can find it in Mr.Jockers’ library!!) I really hope you will read this book and enjoy it as much as I did. Thanks for reading my letter essay I hope you enjoyed it and found your next book!