Product Description

"A scorching read."--John Grisham

From the depths of World War II, a buried Nazi secret comes to terrifying life...

"An avalanche of action. . .an incredible web of intrigue."--Clive Cussler

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #22243 in Books
• Published on: 1994-04-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 704 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780451179807
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

From Publishers Weekly
A neo-Nazi/South African cartel plots to destroy Israel. BOMC selection in cloth.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
Rudolph Hess--Spandau prisoner number 7--dies in 1987. When a secret "Hess diary" is found at Spandau by a West German policeman, the various police and intelligence agencies stationed in Berlin become even more interested in Hess's 1941 flight to England. Did Hess have highly placed contacts there? Was he alone? Was his well-trained double captured instead? The chain reaction from the diary's discovery explodes around West Germany, England, and South Africa, uncovering secret alliances and double agents. This first novel, which attempts to fill in history's blanks and to tie the past with the present, has action, characters, and violence to spare. But the body count is high, even for this genre, and the novel loses its impact long before the end of the drawn-out plot. An optional purchase for large popular fiction collections.
- V. Louise Saylor, Eastern Washington Univ. Lib., Cheney
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Kirkus Reviews
Long but largely rewarding first thriller in which the apparent suicide of imprisoned Nazi Rudolf Hess sets the KGB, the Stasi, the CIA, Israelis, South Africans, and the Berlin police to chasing each other and some embarrassing papers--which may or may not have been written by Mr. Hess, who may or may not have been Mr. Hess. It's the late 80's, and the cracks in the Eastern bloc are just starting to show. Berlin is still controlled by the WW II Allied powers, who've spent millions to keep Hess locked up in Spandau Prison. It was Hess who made the mysterious flight to England at the beginning of the war, supposedly to seek a separate peace through negotiations with sympathetic aristocrats. Now, the prisoner has hung himself. Or has he? He's certainly dead, but it may have been murder. There has always been doubt about his identity--and the Russians have always been strangely adamant about paroling the old fascist. Then, as Spandau is being razed, Hans Apfel, a young German policeman, finds a hidden sheaf of papers written in Latin by the old prisoner, a document that, if released, will prove immensely embarrassing to a number of people, including the British royal family, a good hunk of the British aristocracy, and far too many German policemen on both sides of the Iron Curtain. A long line forms to try to get the papers back from Apfel, who wants to sell them, and his pretty wife Ilse, who wants to turn them in. Things become terribly violent terribly quickly, and Hans has to accept help from his estranged father, the best cop in Berlin.... The central mystery, why Hess went to England and why so many people don't want the truth to get out, isn't quite interesting enough to last the great length here. It's up to a few heroic, middle-aged policemen to hang onto the reader. They're usually successful. -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Customer Reviews

An Action-Packed Thriller With Too Many Pages!
Greg Iles really packed the action into "Spandau Phoenix." I would have rated the book higher, but it is way too long and goes off on many unnecessary tangents. A tighter narrative would have made a more suspenseful, and enjoyable read. However, if you have the patience to hang-in through almost 700 pages, you may find this suspense thriller very worth while.

Berlin's Spandau Prison, where WWII Nazi war criminals were kept, was the last residence of Rudolph Hess, Prisoner #7, and Hitler's one time second in command. Hess left Nazi Germany in 1941 and flew a plane to Great Britain. His reasons, or mission, for going to the UK were never revealed. Hitler publicly called Hess insane for making the flight and parachuting into enemy territory. When Hess supposedly committed suicide in his prison cell in 1987, he was Spandau's last occupant. The prison was then scheduled to be destroyed. As crowds gathered to watch the demolition of this famous building, Berlin police were assigned to maintain crown control. KGB agents diligently photographed the crowd for later identification by the East German Stasi. Among the observers was an Israeli agent. A German police captain, in charge of the contingent guarding the rubble, unexpectedly finds mysterious papers hidden in what was Hess' cell. The papers were all written in Latin, a language he does not understand, except for the first paragraph, which is in German. The paragraph interested the police officer enough for him to bring the papers home to his wife to translate.

Thus begins a desperate and brutal quest by the Soviets, British, Americans, and an Israeli agent for the Spandau Diaries - a search which leaves many dead bodies in its wake. Was Rudolph Hess really Prisoner #7, or did he have a double? Did Hess have a political agenda when he parachuted into Great Britain or was he really insane? Were members of the British nobility involved in a subversive plot with Hess and Hitler?

This novel involves Germans, Russians, Israelis, British, Americans, South Africans, and Libyans. Iles' extraordinary tale takes the reader on a terrifying adventure into the past, which leads to the chilling realities of the present, that could very well result in worldwide nuclear war. His action scenes are so well written that they are almost visual, and certainly bring this drama to life. The main characters are complex and well defined, individually and in their relationships to each other. The ending will have you on the edge of your seat.

In spite of the book's unnecessary length, and a confusing narrative at the beginning, I do recommend "Spandau Phoenix" to fans of mystery-thrillers and espionage novels. Bottom line - great plot and characters overcome any flaws.
JANA

Brilliant, fast paced, scorcher.
Rudolph who? Who knows. The story is sooooooo fantastic that you will have a hard time distinguishing reality and fantasy in this amazing work of fiction. This is easily one of my favorite books of all time. Iles paints brilliant characters who move quickly in an intricately woven plot. How does the "evil spirit of Facism" continue 40 years after the war is over? This book is convincing in it's presentation of this idea (and many other subtle and not so subtle political ideologies) that will have you thinking and rethinking your views of the current geopolitical scheme of the world. There is nothing negative to say about this book except that it ends... Absolutely brilliant. Kevin Hogan, ...

Complicated but thrilling.
This is simply an outstanding book. Right from the get go Iles grabs you and doesn't let loose. The book flies by as you gobble up the words, which lead from scene to scene. Parallel timeframes are traced up to the same moment but through a different set of eyes. Iles juggles many balls in the air at the same time but manages to keep them separated and suspended together. A very carefully woven fabric of intrigue entices the reader to keep going. The violence in the book is appropriate to the subject matter and is never gratuitous. There are some nasty people in the world and Iles is writing about the nastiest. There are no super heroes. Many times it's hard to tell the good guys from the bad. There are no writer's crutches, gimmicks, or supernatural ploys to spoil the suspense. You don't know what will happen next and that makes for an excellent book. The sheer volume of events and characters make this a book inappropriate for readers with a short attention span. This book is not the mindless, pulp fiction pap that fills so many best seller lists today. This book has some meat to it, which is so much more satisfying than most of the formula novels churned out for mass consumption. When I finished the book I felt I had read my money's worth. Mr. Iles has another satisfied customer.