The Falcons of Malta

Its been a while since I read a new AH novel. Its been longer since, I read a WW2 novel. I am simply bored with Nazis. They are everywhere, Every dam villain in cartoons to congressional hearings is a Nazi. Yeah I get it racism is bad. Yes. There is a problem with Nazis as stock villains they always do the same villainy. Someone telegenic gets discriminated against... This leaves nothing new for the viewer what are you going to do that is going to to top Schindlers list or the Pianist There is also very little conflict- because we no the Nazis are not supermen. This was my problem with Khan in the new trek film. Khan was written as a Nazi, rather than as Superman...Bloody DC comics gets it better.


Well the POD is Hitler dies, poisoned by accident after the fall of France.
A Goering / Reynard H  coup takes over the Reich.  Reynard H, the hangman of Prague, uses the Nazi party to gain power over Europe and win the war. Its a cast of thousands and we see things from  Berlin palaces to back street cafes. The story focuses on two teens, who blunder into the action. One a HJ member who gets caught up and promoted and decorated in the chaos that follows. The lad is tall, his voice breaking and clumsy and awkward. He is well observed and well written. There is his Juliet, a Jewish German from Hungary.  The two meet when the lad saves Greta from a mob in a border incident

What I like about the book, is that we see the world war as most people lived it. Not bright uniforms, gleaming steel ships, and Moonlight serenade. But people scrambling to survive, where a few pairs of trousers is loot, and a hot meal a big deal. The boy is confused, the girl is told in no certain terms, not to be coy by her parents. They need their German protector

I should explain that one of the plot points is that the Nazis are now better lead, and willing to be more reasonable on the Jewish issue. Basically Reynard will send Europe's Jews south to be the subjects and colonists of the new Italian empire. The Germans bully the Italians into taking their lead, and instead of the battle of Britain we get an invasion of Malta This is after a brief bloody war in Hungary.

The book pulls no punches with the Nazis. The Germans are better let and more cynical. The writer uses  Reynard using Orwell's two plus two equals five as a motif to inform the reader when the party line is going to change, or overlook something. But we see Goering having to physically control himself to stop a temper tantrum, despite the fact he wishes to drink and fornicate. Eichmann torturing a Jewish teen, is one of the darkest pieces of writing I have seen outside S.M Stirling. If Stirling writes about the darkness, Palter catches the fog  of war, or life. The Edwardian major general at the docks in Malta is one of my favourite scenes

Though I knew the plot, I admired how Palter and Rhode kept up the tension, I knew the ending but neither side had it easy. The British do not sit back, and spend their fury on plot armour

Occasionally some of the writing is jarring. German generals keep saying as if! As if it were 98 and there is a subplot with Oriana I see no point with. Finally the Money penny character while well observed the name gets grating

The last great WW2 AH. The Belisarius of a ruined AH