History Lessons: The Arms Maker of Berlin drops knowledge and never drops the ball on drama

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History Lessons: The Arms Maker of Berlin drops knowledge and never drops the ball on drama

POSTED: Wednesday, August 26, 2009, 5:28 PM

Filed Under: Arts Books

Knopf, 367 pp., $25.95, Aug. 4

Nothing's better than a good spy novel, and nothing's worse than a bad one. In The Arms Maker of Berlin, Dan Fesperman combines World War II and contemporary mystery ' and, pleasantly, it's not predictable.

The Arms Maker follows college history professor Nat Turnbull through the ever-elusive mystery of Nazi Germany. While Turnbull is an expert in the field of modern German history, he knows as well as anyone that much of what happened during WWII remains hidden.' When the sudden arrest of his former mentor partners Turnbull with the FBI, the professor finds himself dragged outside of his quiet life in the library and into the intriguing world of espionage. Turnbull soon discovers that most things, including his mentor's war stories, are not at all what they seem. Through delving into documents, interviews with the few remaining war survivors, and the assistance of a competitive and oh-so-sexy German lady-professor, Turnbull is able to put together the pieces of the mystery of the missing war documents and anti-Hitler White Rose student movement, while making some other important discoveries along the way.

Throughout his novel, Fesperman slowly reveals details and clues that help lead to the book's suspenseful end. Carefully bouncing between Turnbull, modern Germany, and WWII Switzerland and Germany, Fesperman's book always gives readers just enough information to keep us informed and intrigued; by the last couple chapters, there's no putting this book down. While the book is fiction, Fesperman does an excellent job basing The Arms Maker on historical and modern accuracies, particularly the fact that many of the last survivors of WWII are dying, and taking history with them.

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