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Henri Poincaré Mystery #2
The Tenth Witness
(Although published later, this is actually a prequel to "All Cry Chaos.")
On the night of October 9, 1799, the frigate HMS Lutine breaks apart on the shoals of the Frisian Islands off the dutch coast. When the insurer Lloyds of London pays on the wreck, it takes ownership and plans expeditions to recoup the lost millions in gold and silver. Nearly two hundred years later, after a series of largely failed salvage operations, Lloyds tries again - this time on the strength of new technologies and a strategy devised by the gifted young engineer Henri Poincare.
It is late spring, 1978. Poincare has worked to near-exhaustion preparing for the Luntine dive. Before the salvage season begins, he takes a rare holiday: a hike at low tide across the vast, muddy flats of the Wadden Sea. His guide is Liesel Kraus - smart, able appealing...and troubled. She and her brother Anselm, directors of Kraus Steel, are haunted by a violent history that generates both rage and an enormous, corrputing wealth. The closer Poincare draws to Liesel and Anselm, the more warped life becomes until love and a death threat compel him to investigate what no one else - aside from Interpol - will. Pain as well as treasure, he discovers, can be dredged up from the past to reshape the present.
The Tenth Witness, a prequel to the award-winning , is the tale of a man upended: a twenty-eight year old who rejects a brilliant career in engineering for an uncertain, darker one: international police work.
On the night of October 9, 1799, the frigate HMS Lutine breaks apart on the shoals of the Frisian Islands off the dutch coast. When the insurer Lloyds of London pays on the wreck, it takes ownership and plans expeditions to recoup the lost millions in gold and silver. Nearly two hundred years later, after a series of largely failed salvage operations, Lloyds tries again - this time on the strength of new technologies and a strategy devised by the gifted young engineer Henri Poincare.
It is late spring, 1978. Poincare has worked to near-exhaustion preparing for the Luntine dive. Before the salvage season begins, he takes a rare holiday: a hike at low tide across the vast, muddy flats of the Wadden Sea. His guide is Liesel Kraus - smart, able appealing...and troubled. She and her brother Anselm, directors of Kraus Steel, are haunted by a violent history that generates both rage and an enormous, corrputing wealth. The closer Poincare draws to Liesel and Anselm, the more warped life becomes until love and a death threat compel him to investigate what no one else - aside from Interpol - will. Pain as well as treasure, he discovers, can be dredged up from the past to reshape the present.
The Tenth Witness, a prequel to the award-winning , is the tale of a man upended: a twenty-eight year old who rejects a brilliant career in engineering for an uncertain, darker one: international police work.
288 pages, Hardcover
First published August 16, 2013
About the author
Leonard Rosen
8 books37 followersAka Leonard J. Rosen
Leonard Rosen lives and works in the Boston area. He has contributed radio commentaries to Boston’s NPR station, written best-selling textbooks on writing, and taught writing at Harvard University and Bentley University. The Kortelisy Escape is his third novel--a suspenseful stand-alone concerning the lives of an aging stage magician and his 14-year-old granddaughter apprentice. Publishers Weekly calls it a "gem of a crime novel."
His award-winning, multiply translated debut, All Cry Chaos, and the follow-on The Tenth Witness, introduce Interpol agent Henri Poincaré.
Len enjoys corresponding with readers and meeting with book groups online. Contact him through his website: lenrosenonline.com.
Leonard Rosen lives and works in the Boston area. He has contributed radio commentaries to Boston’s NPR station, written best-selling textbooks on writing, and taught writing at Harvard University and Bentley University. The Kortelisy Escape is his third novel--a suspenseful stand-alone concerning the lives of an aging stage magician and his 14-year-old granddaughter apprentice. Publishers Weekly calls it a "gem of a crime novel."
His award-winning, multiply translated debut, All Cry Chaos, and the follow-on The Tenth Witness, introduce Interpol agent Henri Poincaré.
Len enjoys corresponding with readers and meeting with book groups online. Contact him through his website: lenrosenonline.com.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 83 reviews
April 7, 2016
3.5 stars.
This was mystery, historical fiction, modern treasure hunters, family history & WWII. I like all of those things. This was creatively written. The author tied everything together so neatly into this story. It also had some great twists that kept me engaged.
I liked the MC and some of the older characters. But I had a hard time with the main female character. She wasn't as well drawn as the others. Even the characters with minor roles, were better fleshed out. And the romance didn't work for me. It just seemed too simplistic and choppy. I had a hard time even picturing those two together, without any effort or understanding.
This was mystery, historical fiction, modern treasure hunters, family history & WWII. I like all of those things. This was creatively written. The author tied everything together so neatly into this story. It also had some great twists that kept me engaged.
I liked the MC and some of the older characters. But I had a hard time with the main female character. She wasn't as well drawn as the others. Even the characters with minor roles, were better fleshed out. And the romance didn't work for me. It just seemed too simplistic and choppy. I had a hard time even picturing those two together, without any effort or understanding.
February 15, 2018
As indicated by the description, although written later than All Cry Chaos, it actually takes place earlier. This fills in some gaps in the character of Henri Poincare, great-grandson of his famous namesake, and is an even better story than the other. My rating is more like 3.5. Although there is much to be appreciated about the plot, the story sort of falls apart at the end. Still, I liked the book enough to round up to 4-stars.
February 23, 2018
Good solid plot driven novel which is both a strength and weakness as Henri Poincare in this second offering of the franchise is flat. I think too that I am a little read-out and filmed-out with WW2 Holocaust material. I know it's probably politically incorrect, But I get it! We should never forget either that iteration or it's contemporary manifestation(s) in various global theatres. However the dearth of material / focus upon this era runs the danger of indifference or worse still a belief that it is the only matter of the type worthy of documenting in fiction, non fiction and all matters of.literary - artistic expression.
September 12, 2018
Já jsem to hlavnímu hrdinovi prostě nevěřil. Ani tu lásku, ani naivitu a autorovi to rozuzlení.
September 6, 2013
I've lost count of how many novels I've read about the fingers of the ugly World War II past reaching into the present. It's a challenge to make a fresh story on this theme, but Leonard Rosen's The Tenth Witness shows he is more than up to the task.
The Tenth Witness is a prequel to Rosen's impressive and original first Henri Poincaré novel, All Cry Chaos. Most of the action in The Tenth Witness takes place in the late 1970s, before Henri has become an Interpol agent. Henri is an engineer, and he and his partner, Alec Chin, have just landed an exciting project: on behalf of Lloyd's of London, they've built a platform from which they hope to recover the 18th-century wreck of the Lutine, a ship that went down off the Dutch coast, laden with gold bars.
While out hiking, Alec meets Liesl Kraus, and their attraction is immediate. Liesl turns out to be a very wealthy young woman, the daughter of Otto Kraus, founder of Kraus Steel. Henri is soon introduced to Liesl's family, including her charming brother, Anselm, who now runs the firm's operations, and her uncle, Viktor Schmidt, whose bluff heartiness feels to Henri as if its hiding something more menacing.
Henri, who has an honorary uncle Isaac who was a Jewish Holocaust survivor, is curious and cautious about the Kraus family, especially since Anselm and Viktor seem eager for Henri to become involved in some of their overseas businesses. Henri learns that Otto Kraus was a member of the Nazi Party and produced steel for the German war effort, with production fueled by slave labor. After Germany lost the war, Otto had a get-out-of-jail-free card, though: an affidavit, signed by 10 Jewish workers at Kraus Steel, swearing that Kraus had saved lives of the slave laborers; a veritable Oskar Schindler.
When hints surface that the whole Kraus-as-Schindler story might not be the real deal, Henri's love for his adoptive uncle compels him to try to unearth the truth, whatever the cost to himself, his career and his relationship with Liesl. The story really takes off at this point, with Alec traveling around the world gathering intelligence. Henri spends almost as much time slogging through archival documents, and Rosen's writing makes that part of the search every bit as tense and compelling as the globe trotting.
Henri's work and research take him to facilities in the third world where workers who are desperate for any kind of employment are treated only marginally better than the Nazi slave laborers, and to countries where individual freedoms and lives are sacrificed in the name of security and progress. Without being at all sanctimonious, Rosen makes us look at the situational ethics so many used during the Nazi era and ask ourselves if we are so sure we'd have done the right thing, not the expedient thing––and if the choices we make today can stand up to close scrutiny.
As with All Cry Chaos, there is so much going on in this novel; murder, romance, science and technology, a chase after Nazis, and the quest for a gold-laden shipwreck. The plotting is intricate but fast-paced, the storytelling lean but with plenty of food for thought and emotion.
Leonard Rosen has created an appealing and complex protagonist in Henri Poincaré, and his novels offer far more than the usual thriller or whodunnit. If you haven't read them yet, pick one and see for yourself.
Note: I received a free review copy of this book.
The Tenth Witness is a prequel to Rosen's impressive and original first Henri Poincaré novel, All Cry Chaos. Most of the action in The Tenth Witness takes place in the late 1970s, before Henri has become an Interpol agent. Henri is an engineer, and he and his partner, Alec Chin, have just landed an exciting project: on behalf of Lloyd's of London, they've built a platform from which they hope to recover the 18th-century wreck of the Lutine, a ship that went down off the Dutch coast, laden with gold bars.
While out hiking, Alec meets Liesl Kraus, and their attraction is immediate. Liesl turns out to be a very wealthy young woman, the daughter of Otto Kraus, founder of Kraus Steel. Henri is soon introduced to Liesl's family, including her charming brother, Anselm, who now runs the firm's operations, and her uncle, Viktor Schmidt, whose bluff heartiness feels to Henri as if its hiding something more menacing.
Henri, who has an honorary uncle Isaac who was a Jewish Holocaust survivor, is curious and cautious about the Kraus family, especially since Anselm and Viktor seem eager for Henri to become involved in some of their overseas businesses. Henri learns that Otto Kraus was a member of the Nazi Party and produced steel for the German war effort, with production fueled by slave labor. After Germany lost the war, Otto had a get-out-of-jail-free card, though: an affidavit, signed by 10 Jewish workers at Kraus Steel, swearing that Kraus had saved lives of the slave laborers; a veritable Oskar Schindler.
When hints surface that the whole Kraus-as-Schindler story might not be the real deal, Henri's love for his adoptive uncle compels him to try to unearth the truth, whatever the cost to himself, his career and his relationship with Liesl. The story really takes off at this point, with Alec traveling around the world gathering intelligence. Henri spends almost as much time slogging through archival documents, and Rosen's writing makes that part of the search every bit as tense and compelling as the globe trotting.
Henri's work and research take him to facilities in the third world where workers who are desperate for any kind of employment are treated only marginally better than the Nazi slave laborers, and to countries where individual freedoms and lives are sacrificed in the name of security and progress. Without being at all sanctimonious, Rosen makes us look at the situational ethics so many used during the Nazi era and ask ourselves if we are so sure we'd have done the right thing, not the expedient thing––and if the choices we make today can stand up to close scrutiny.
As with All Cry Chaos, there is so much going on in this novel; murder, romance, science and technology, a chase after Nazis, and the quest for a gold-laden shipwreck. The plotting is intricate but fast-paced, the storytelling lean but with plenty of food for thought and emotion.
Leonard Rosen has created an appealing and complex protagonist in Henri Poincaré, and his novels offer far more than the usual thriller or whodunnit. If you haven't read them yet, pick one and see for yourself.
Note: I received a free review copy of this book.
August 26, 2013
Hiking the flats of the Wadden Sea can be hard work and dangerous, but author Leonard Rosen provides a wise guide in Liesel Kraus for his character, Henri Poincare. There’s a haunting appeal to heading out over land often covered by water, to see what’s really there, to take on a challenge and get away from the business of everyday life. But Poincare, having tested his physical limits on the walk, soon finds his intellect and emotions tested too, as his life and Liesel’s become more intertwined.
A beautiful German home and a thriving German business provide the backdrop for much of this novel. If business associates live in Argentina, well, that’s not so strange; many Germans moved there after the war. And if Henri’s adopted uncle might almost have known Liesel’s father, that’s just the sort of pleasing coincidence that makes them seem made for each other. Except that Henri’s uncle was Jewish. When his uncle dies, the boy who loved his imaginative stories sets out across his own Wadden Sea to find the truth of a holocaust survivor’s hidden depths. The journey’s harder and more dangerous than he expects.
Convincing science, history and geography anchor this tale, giving it depth and power. Vividly haunting descriptions of mudflats, Hong Kong harbors, third-world laborers and first-world affluence tie the start of the computer age to a darker time before. And Liesel and Henri’s parallel searches into the past bring as many surprises as the hunt for shipwrecked treasure.
The older Poincare was a fascinating protagonist in Leonard Rosen’s earlier novel, All Cry Chaos. Here he’s convincingly youthful and idealistic, a young man learning that hidden things can be dark, sticky and hard to clean off as the Wadden Sea’s mud, but can still hold treasure. It’s a treasure of a novel.
Disclosure: I was sent a free preview edition by the publisher with a request for my honest review.
A beautiful German home and a thriving German business provide the backdrop for much of this novel. If business associates live in Argentina, well, that’s not so strange; many Germans moved there after the war. And if Henri’s adopted uncle might almost have known Liesel’s father, that’s just the sort of pleasing coincidence that makes them seem made for each other. Except that Henri’s uncle was Jewish. When his uncle dies, the boy who loved his imaginative stories sets out across his own Wadden Sea to find the truth of a holocaust survivor’s hidden depths. The journey’s harder and more dangerous than he expects.
Convincing science, history and geography anchor this tale, giving it depth and power. Vividly haunting descriptions of mudflats, Hong Kong harbors, third-world laborers and first-world affluence tie the start of the computer age to a darker time before. And Liesel and Henri’s parallel searches into the past bring as many surprises as the hunt for shipwrecked treasure.
The older Poincare was a fascinating protagonist in Leonard Rosen’s earlier novel, All Cry Chaos. Here he’s convincingly youthful and idealistic, a young man learning that hidden things can be dark, sticky and hard to clean off as the Wadden Sea’s mud, but can still hold treasure. It’s a treasure of a novel.
Disclosure: I was sent a free preview edition by the publisher with a request for my honest review.
August 24, 2013
I thought I had already put this one on Goodreads, so forgive me if I have! This is a "prequel" to his novel All Cry Chaos, which I have previously read. I had the opportunity to read a preview copy of The Tenth Witness and it is great! It tells the story of how Henri Poincare became the great detective he is. Very good plotting, very good character development and I highly recommend both of these books. Here is what Amazon says: On the night of October 9, 1799, the frigate HMS Lutine breaks apart on the shoals of the Frisian Islands off the Dutch coast. When the insurer Lloyds of London pays on the wreck, it takes ownership and plans expeditions to recoup the lost millions in gold and silver. Nearly two hundres years later, after a series of largely failed salvage operations, Lloyds tries again - this time on the strength of new technologies and a strategy devised by the gifted young engineer Henri Poincare.
It is late spring, 1978. Poincare has worked to near-exhaustion preparing for the Lutine dive. Before the salvage season begins, he takes a rare holiday: a hike at low tide across the vast, muddy flats of the Wadden Sea. His guide is Liesel Kraus - smart, able, appealing...and troubled. She and her brother Anselm, directors of Kraus Steel, are haunted by a violent history that generates both rage and an enormous, corrupting wealth. The closer Poincare draws to Liesel and Anselm, the more warped life becomes until love and a death threat compel him to investigate what no one else - aside from Interpol - will. Pain as well as treasure, he discovers, can be dredged up from the past to reshape the present.
The Tenth Witness, a prequel to the award-winning All Cry Chaos, is the tale of a man upended: a twenty-eight year old who rejects a brilliant career in engineering for an uncertain, darker one: international police work.
It is late spring, 1978. Poincare has worked to near-exhaustion preparing for the Lutine dive. Before the salvage season begins, he takes a rare holiday: a hike at low tide across the vast, muddy flats of the Wadden Sea. His guide is Liesel Kraus - smart, able, appealing...and troubled. She and her brother Anselm, directors of Kraus Steel, are haunted by a violent history that generates both rage and an enormous, corrupting wealth. The closer Poincare draws to Liesel and Anselm, the more warped life becomes until love and a death threat compel him to investigate what no one else - aside from Interpol - will. Pain as well as treasure, he discovers, can be dredged up from the past to reshape the present.
The Tenth Witness, a prequel to the award-winning All Cry Chaos, is the tale of a man upended: a twenty-eight year old who rejects a brilliant career in engineering for an uncertain, darker one: international police work.
July 29, 2013
I’ve just finished The Tenth Witness and am left with that too-rare bittersweet aftertaste common to many bookaholics: thoroughly enjoyed this tasty and wonderful read, but disappointed that I’ll have to wait to devour another book in the Henri Poincare series. Akin to concluding a heartfelt visit to great friends. Please write more and faster, Leonard Rosen!
This is a meticulously plotted mystery that is simultaneously character driven. It’s a prequel to the wonderful “All Cry Chaos” (read this!), illuminating Henri’s evolving path from a youthful, becoming-successful engineer toward becoming a gifted Interpol agent/detective.
The Tenth Witness is related by Henri – and how I love well-done literature that reveals the perceptions, thoughts and conflicts of a multi-layered character in a way that only first-person POV can do – who is intelligent, thoughtful, perceptive, determined – as well as driven by an internal moral beacon.
Overall verdict?: Great story, superior and tasty wording, high level of plotting, believable and interesting characters make this a great read. Even if you’re not a mystery aficionado, do yourself a great favor and read both “All Cry Chaos” and “The Tenth Witness.”
This is a meticulously plotted mystery that is simultaneously character driven. It’s a prequel to the wonderful “All Cry Chaos” (read this!), illuminating Henri’s evolving path from a youthful, becoming-successful engineer toward becoming a gifted Interpol agent/detective.
The Tenth Witness is related by Henri – and how I love well-done literature that reveals the perceptions, thoughts and conflicts of a multi-layered character in a way that only first-person POV can do – who is intelligent, thoughtful, perceptive, determined – as well as driven by an internal moral beacon.
Overall verdict?: Great story, superior and tasty wording, high level of plotting, believable and interesting characters make this a great read. Even if you’re not a mystery aficionado, do yourself a great favor and read both “All Cry Chaos” and “The Tenth Witness.”
October 5, 2013
Stunning novel that is a prequel to Rosen's All Cry Chaos. This fascinating story takes us back to the 1970s and the continuing aftermath of the Holocaust - its survivors and its perpetuators, decades later. Rosen's protagonist French engineer Henri Poincare is just starting his career and encounters the moral complexity of doing business with Germans who may have had a hand in the making of the Nazi war machine. Rosen is a superb writer who deftly provides a taut and surprising plot that provides deep insight into his characters, the European landscape of survivors of the Holocaust and the Nazi regime, and ethical dilemmas that remain very current. For Poincare, this reveals his early background and first contact with Interpol.
Now, I must read All Cry Chaos at once! Highly recommended for readers who enjoy intelligent thrillers threaded with fine historical research.
Now, I must read All Cry Chaos at once! Highly recommended for readers who enjoy intelligent thrillers threaded with fine historical research.
July 20, 2013
(note: this was an ARC)
Given that this is a prequel, I wasn't quite sure what to expect, but this was a fabulous book. Digging deeply into questions of guilt by association, the aftermath of war and its corresponding guilt for all who are left behind, and how we handle serious ethical dilemmas, especially when they impact our livelihood and our relationships, and combining those themes with a solid storyline, Rosen has produced a great follow-up to "All Cry Chaos," which I loved. Poincaré's character becomes even more layered, as some of his back story is revealed. I look forward to future books with these characters.
Given that this is a prequel, I wasn't quite sure what to expect, but this was a fabulous book. Digging deeply into questions of guilt by association, the aftermath of war and its corresponding guilt for all who are left behind, and how we handle serious ethical dilemmas, especially when they impact our livelihood and our relationships, and combining those themes with a solid storyline, Rosen has produced a great follow-up to "All Cry Chaos," which I loved. Poincaré's character becomes even more layered, as some of his back story is revealed. I look forward to future books with these characters.
July 30, 2013
4.5 stars. A compelling mystery with a likable protagonist, intriguing plot line, and a sense that things aren't going to end well for our star-crossed lovers. This book dives into the chilling history of Nazi Germany and the repercussions that are still evident. Henri Poincaré is investigating his family friend's past during the Holocaust, and discovers the man was once interred at a steel mill/concentration camp, living in horrific conditions. The problem? The mill was run by his current girlfriend's father.
The Tenth Witness was captivating and heartbreaking. I heartily recommend it for all mystery and thriller fans.
The Tenth Witness was captivating and heartbreaking. I heartily recommend it for all mystery and thriller fans.
October 3, 2013
This was a thoroughly remarkable, incredible read written on an staggering event that should never be forgotten (and in many cases has yet to be explained)! The book was well researched with a lot of historical realities which need to always be remembered and forgiven as everyone takes accountability for what transpired and hopefully will never happen again. And yet, as the author points out, we’re all guilty in one way or another of evil occurrences every day in our own lives! The story was well written, well plotted and ended with me thinking of what happened, how it happened, and hopefully never happens again! A real good thinking book!
October 5, 2014
A very good little mystery. Nazis and gold and adventure and questions of reconciling one's family's past. The characters are well-wrought, the pacing is excellent, and the emotion is genuine. The world is a wonky place and The Tenth Witness, though fictional, is culled from research into the actual goings-on of people, corporations, and governments--both throughout and after the rise of the Reich--in an attempt to reiterate that wonkiness.
ARC received fro free from the Author via a ShelfAwareness giveaway.
ARC received fro free from the Author via a ShelfAwareness giveaway.
December 2, 2013
4.5, An Engineer, in 1978,using the steel from a German plant falls in love with the steel magnate's daughter, only to find her father used the slave labor of Jew & other war victims to produce steel for the Nazis. A fiction biography of this steel man was written to hide what he did for the Nazis and the Engineer uncovered it as fake. Justice won over Love, no statue of limitations on war crimes.
September 17, 2015
Interesting enough to keep me engaged...an investigative book that is heavy on Continental nuance, and shows how a web of lies can be very difficult to cut through, and how destroying that web can bring collateral damage that no one expects...
January 1, 2018
Really liked the actual history woven into the story.
April 13, 2015
A totally different look at WWII and the nature of evil. Advertised as a mystery/thriller, but there's enough morality and grey areas that a Bookclub might enjoy a discussion.
May 17, 2017
It's too bad that Leonard Rosen hasn't written more books. I've read his two published books and think they are terrific. This book was written in 2013, and has all the makings of a great series. But I'm afraid illness or something beyond his control has kept him from writing more. Rosen crafts an interesting if not unusual plot that has Henri Poincare searching old Nazi records, and visiting surviving Jews where he hopes to find out more about a favorite uncle who recently died. Complications arise when he becomes romantically involved with Liesel Kraus, member of the Krause Steel company. Henri's searching leads him to Nazi involvement of family members. As Henri locates where people are that can tell him about his uncle, they dies before he can reach them. Their deaths are only suspicious to Henri. They are other story lines that add to the intrigue and make a great read. I would live to read more from Rosen.
November 8, 2018
The plot of this book is set in France and Germany the 1970’s, when World War 2 was a not-so-distant memory. While the younger generation can almost forget it happened, some of their parents hide deep wounds and others hide dark secrets. How much can the younger generation pretend not to know? Are they as different from their parents as they would like to think? And should all secrets be uncovered?
This is the second book in the series, and I liked it, but not quite as well as the first. But it asked some good questions.
This is the second book in the series, and I liked it, but not quite as well as the first. But it asked some good questions.
November 2, 2024
Audio book: read by my favourite person, Grover Gardner, who can really make a story come to life.
It took me a little bit to actually get totally hooked on this story.
The beginning was difficult to follow, in that I didn't quite know where exactly the plot was going.
However, once things and characters took root, I was totally hooked.
A gripping, story of greed, deceit and the evils war brings.
I suppose I had a bit of a 'heads up' since I had listened to the second book in this series first, and knew about the MC and his family life, but it didn't detract at all from this book.
It took me a little bit to actually get totally hooked on this story.
The beginning was difficult to follow, in that I didn't quite know where exactly the plot was going.
However, once things and characters took root, I was totally hooked.
A gripping, story of greed, deceit and the evils war brings.
I suppose I had a bit of a 'heads up' since I had listened to the second book in this series first, and knew about the MC and his family life, but it didn't detract at all from this book.
February 3, 2020
i enjoyed this book so much more than the first, all cry chaos. this is the second, but the prequel to all cry chaos and it tells the story of the main character when he was younger. it tells how he was trained as and became an engineer but because events during a job his life takes a dramatic turn and ultimately to his new career. i try to never give any spoilers in a review so this could sound cryptic but i really try not to be. i highly recommend this book.
May 15, 2018
This was the audible edition and the narrator seemed wrong for the story--less like a teller of tales and more like listening to a newscast of events. I also felt the book was less story and more moral lecture. So it was ok, but if I'd heard this one first, I wouldn't have listened to the other one--which I really enjoyed.
August 28, 2018
This book relates to a certain time. I am of that time, so, when visiting my family in Germany as a boy, I wondered what the grey haired Germans around me had done in the war. It seems I was not the only one... My uncles had been in the Wehrmacht, but many others had much darker pasts. Not all fled the Motherland.
Read
June 9, 2020I very rarely read fantasy, but a friend recommended this, and it purported to have a talking cat, so I succumbed. However, the fantasy was very heavy, and 20% of the way through there was no cat yet, so I moved on to something more my speed. Also, this was not billed as YA but definitely is.
February 26, 2021
*3, 75
Druhý díl, i když je to vlastně zcela samostatné. Jiný příběh. Nikterak nesouvisející. Druhý je spojen s válkou, Židy a zločinem. Je mnohem čtivější, zajímavější, více pro běžného čtenáře. Takže hodnocení okolo 4* si zaslouží.
Stále to ale není moje parketa a podruhé bych do toho nešla.
Druhý díl, i když je to vlastně zcela samostatné. Jiný příběh. Nikterak nesouvisející. Druhý je spojen s válkou, Židy a zločinem. Je mnohem čtivější, zajímavější, více pro běžného čtenáře. Takže hodnocení okolo 4* si zaslouží.
Stále to ale není moje parketa a podruhé bych do toho nešla.
November 2, 2013
One of the worst books I have read in years (1) clunky dialogue and scene descriptions. It is kind of hard to believe that Rosen teaches writing. Examples are almost too numerous to mention. "That night Liesel nearly consumed me in bed.....We thrashed". Liesel is the woman that our hero, Henri Poincare, falls in love/lust with basically over one weekend, and that sets the arc of the rest of this unrealistic story into motion. Another from a scene in which Henri is talking to a seasoned war crimes investigation veteran who has just reflected on how many Nazis got away with their crimes, " The number hung in the room before it died, and for a moment Plannik wouldn't meet my eyes. Watching him was like watching the time-lapse decay of a corpse, from life to bloat to festering flesh to bone". Ugh. For more cringe inducing sentences, just read the book. There is at least one on every page that will send shudders up your spine 2) the all good versus all bad guy approach. Our hero, Henri Poincare, walks on the side of angels. The same goes for everyone he knows or reflects on from his childhood. Everyone is intelligent, industrious, honest, frugal (at one point Henri turns down the offer to fly to Argentina to meet with government representatives on a project so that they won't have to pay for his expenses. This is mentioned twice in the book), loving, they all love children, ethical. And, of course, his father was part of the French Resistance. Perhaps in an effort to provide balance, Rosen does throw in a scene where our hero has a momentary lapse and thinks ill of a Roma woman that he meets. This so upsets him that he walks the streets through the entire night, until dawn. He wanted to walk in order to "drain the swamp of his self disgust". He pushed on, "hoping to numb myself". And then there was another very brief scene where an older Jew made a derogatory statement about a black family. I suppose it could be said that the point of these is that this looking down on other groups could happen to anyone but both of these scenes felt like they were thrown in without much thought and did not really fit in to the overall narrative. And then on the other hand, the Germans (and their heirs, by virtue of inheriting anything from their parents and grandparents) were bad (there was only one good German in the book, not counting children, and that was the aforementioned Plannek, who is apparently turning into a corpse right before our eyes anyway. Our hero, Henri, reflects on "the evil German seed"). Also bad were the Catholic Church, the CIA, the OSS, most of South America, especially Argentina, the International Red Cross, and the Grimms' Fairy Tales. So righteous was our hero, Henri, that unless his love/lust interest, Liesel, responds to a reading from an objectionable Grimms story in exactly the way he thinks she should, he would leave her immediately 3) The Marathon Man. Everyone remembers the Marathon Man story, where a desperate ex-Nazi corners Dustin Hoffman (in the movie) in an abandoned warehouse and, using a dentist drill, tortures him while continually asking "is it safe, is it safe?). In this book, we have a desperate ex-Nazi who corners our hero, Henri, in an abandoned warehouse, and inflicts torture (though luckily not on our hero, but on someone else, after reverse-clamping our hero's eyelids open so that he has to watch!), in order to make sure that it is safe for the Kraus family to carry on their business interests as they have been and to not have their past dug up. I am not making this up. The only thing missing is the footrace, where the Dustin Hoffman character, a distance runner, tries to escape by outrunning a sprinter. That was actually pretty exciting, especially in that book, and this plodding book could actually have used some of that excitement. Much of the rest of the story involves a sunken frigate, a sunken u-boat, the hunt for a missing person who can provide some testimony to what went on in the 1940's (the 10th witness), but I had minimal interest in that as I approached the end of the book.
It appeared to me that Rosen was basically trying to highlight the many wrongs that happened to the Jews during and after WWII. And that is fine. It's just that he built a pretty skimpy and unbelievable story, with poor writing, to infuse into those facts.
I actually did enjoy his first book, All Cry Chaos. I know that that was one of the books that was nominated for an Edgar for Best First Novel By An American Author. That award was given to Lori Roy for Bent Road, which I thoroughly enjoyed as well. Lori Roy, on the other hand, has written a second book which is also riveting (Until She Comes Home), whereas Leonard Rosen has produced a clunker.
For really insightful stories into this time period, both of which are family stories passed on to their children both in writing (letters, diaries, etc.) and orally and gives you a real feel for what the Jewish population went through during and after WW II, I would recommend 1) I Kiss Your Hands Many Times - Hearts, Souls, and Wars in Hungary by Marianne Szegedy-Maszak and 2)Made In Hungary - A Life Forged By History by Maria Krenz.
It appeared to me that Rosen was basically trying to highlight the many wrongs that happened to the Jews during and after WWII. And that is fine. It's just that he built a pretty skimpy and unbelievable story, with poor writing, to infuse into those facts.
I actually did enjoy his first book, All Cry Chaos. I know that that was one of the books that was nominated for an Edgar for Best First Novel By An American Author. That award was given to Lori Roy for Bent Road, which I thoroughly enjoyed as well. Lori Roy, on the other hand, has written a second book which is also riveting (Until She Comes Home), whereas Leonard Rosen has produced a clunker.
For really insightful stories into this time period, both of which are family stories passed on to their children both in writing (letters, diaries, etc.) and orally and gives you a real feel for what the Jewish population went through during and after WW II, I would recommend 1) I Kiss Your Hands Many Times - Hearts, Souls, and Wars in Hungary by Marianne Szegedy-Maszak and 2)Made In Hungary - A Life Forged By History by Maria Krenz.
January 5, 2019
WWII is over but there are still strong feelings on both sides
April 4, 2019
Very well-written prequel to his other novel "All Cry Chaos."
July 28, 2019
One of my top ten for the year.
September 13, 2013
What does a writer do when his debut mystery novel is praised to the skies, nominated for almost all the awards and loved by the critics? In the case of Leonard Rosen, whose 2011 mystery "All Cry Chaos," featuring engineer turned Interpol agent Henri Poincaré, did all that, you turn around and write a prequel, "The Tenth Witness" (Permanent Press, 288 pages, $29.00, also Kindle edition) showing how it all began.
It's the late spring of 1978. Poincaré is a brilliant mechanical engineer, only 28 years old, who has designed a steel platform enabling divers to retrieve treasure buried at sea. Born in 1950 to a family who fought in the French Resistance against the Germans, Poincaré has no memories of the war, other than what he's learned from survivors and read.
Two centuries before, in 1799, Lloyd’s of London insured an English frigate, the H.M.S. Lutine that sank off the Dutch coast with a cargo of a thousand gold bars; in 1977 Lloyd's hires Poincaré and his partner Alec Chin and their fledgling firm to build a platform to try to recoup their loss.
Poincaré falls in love with Liesel Kraus, who, with her brother Anselm, runs a huge Munich steel company founded by their father, Otto Kraus. Like other industrialists, Kraus was arrested for investigation of war crimes at the end of World War II. Krupp, Bayer, Siemens, I.G. Farben -- as well as the operators of American companies like General Motors and Ford -- were all investigated by so-called deNazification organizations.
Unlike some of the others, Kraus, a member of the Nazi party, had what could be called a "Schindler Defense"; Like the famous Oskar Schindler, Kraus was said to have protected the workers at his plant from the Nazi killing machine. Kraus had obtained an affidavit from ten Jewish workers at the steel plant attesting to his fair treatment of workers -- slave laborers, to be blunt -- at the plant. Kraus, according to the ten witnesses, did everything he could to make life easier for the residents of the adjacent concentration camp who walked to work at the plant.
The steel for the diving platform comes from the postwar re-creation of Kraus' steel mill, financed mysteriously (the financing of the new plant is a spoiler, so I won't go into it). The involvement of the Kraus company leads to Henri meeting and falling in love with beautiful (naturally!), smart and capable 30-year old Liesel.
When Henri's uncle dies, Poincaré discovers he was one of the laborers in Kraus' steel mill, which leads him to probe into the past. Anselm Kraus and a mysterious group of Germans, some of who live in Argentina, don't like this probing and they set about tracking Poincaré's movements. The plot thickens when he travels to Argentina at the invitation of the government with plans for a platform similar to the one in Holland, to rescue treasure from a sunken ship in the treacherous Rio de La Plata.
Sickened by what he sees in Argentina, run by the generals conducting the "Dirty War" after the death of Peron, Henri tells the government officials that the plans he drew for the platform in Europe won't work in the river. He pays off the government official and goes back to Europe to tell Alec Chin. Fortunately, the thriving firm of Poincaré & Chin Consulting Engineers doesn't need the relatively small fee that would have come from selling the blueprints to the Argentines.
In the manner of Alan Furst and Martin Cruz Smith, Rosen is expert in recreating the WWII period and explaining the involvement of Americans, in the form of Operation Paperclip, which brought a user of slave labor named Wernher von Braun (1912-1977) to the U.S., along with dozens of German scientists, as well as the machinations of the O.S.S., the predecessor of the C.I.A.
The skirts of the Roman Catholic Church, and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) are far from clean, Rosen writes, describing how both organizations formed "ratlines" to facilitate the escape of the Nazis to the Arab countries and South America. Of course, the reality of the times -- the Cold War -- led to most of the war criminals continuing to live prosperous, Mercedes-Benz driving lives in West Germany. Rosen deals deftly with the children of the war criminals and how they live with themselves and their knowledge of the crimes committed by their relatives.
Combining history and suspense, "The Tenth Witness" is an outstanding novel that will provide revelations of monstrous crimes against humanity committed by people who mostly got away with it, along with their American corporate partners in murder. Guess who sought reparations after the war from the U.S. government for bomb damage to their German operations, Opel and Ford Werke: You guessed it, G.M. and Ford respectively. Now that's what I call chutzpah! For more on this sordid (and largely unknown) part of our history: http://www.rationalrevolution.net/war...
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