The Eye of the Abyss
A Novel
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4.0 • 2 Ratings
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- $12.99
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
It is Germany, 1938, and Franz Schmidt is the chief auditor in a commercial bank in a provincial city. But as Schmidt will soon learn, the bank's prestigious new client, the Nazi party, is at once its least desirable. Schmidt will oversee their account, and soon, he is embroiled in the duplicity, violence and horror that is Nazi Germany. Schmidt can't help but be involved, and the first victim of the harsh realities of the Germans' politics is a Jewish secretary whom Franz tries to help, much to his wife's distress.
As Schmidt finds himself caught up in dangerous political machinations, he also finds himself, as the result of an act of compassion, under deadly suspicion. The Schmidts struggle to protect their marriage and their family without compromising their sense of decency, but eventually, Franz's world explodes. As events spin out of control, Franz must act, and he seeks revenge on those responsible by attempting a massive fraud on the Party itself.
In Eye of the Abyss, Marshall Browne crafts an intelligent historical thriller reminiscent of Philip Kerr, Christopher Reich and Alan Furst with a riveting pace and spellbinding plot all his own.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Aussie-based Browne takes a break from his highly praised series about a one-legged European police detective, Inspector Anders, to start what one hopes will be another series, about a one-eyed German banker secretly fighting the Nazis. Franz Schmidt, chief auditor for a family-owned bank in an unnamed south German city, loses his eye defending a Jew attacked by Nazi thugs in 1935. A quiet and meticulous man, he apparently bears no grudges, though his wife and best friend aren't so sure. Three years later, when his bank is chosen as a repository for large amounts of Nazi Party cash, the other shoe drops, and Schmidt becomes a man of action. First, he takes great risks trying to help a female bank employee whose mother was Jewish. Then he dreams up a plan to punish Dietrich, the sleek and seductive party operative placed inside the bank. As he did in his two other books (Inspector Anders and the Ship of Fools and The Wooden Leg of Inspector Anders), Browne quickly creates a dark and convincingly Kafkaesque landscape, filled with people whose strengths and weaknesses radiate credibility. Dietrich and another top Nazi, von Streck, are frighteningly vivid, as are the endangered woman, her police inspector father, Schmidt's determined wife and his fragile friend. And Schmidt himself has our complete attention from the beginning, as he and we look for some possible light in the gathering storm of Nazi oppression. Readers who enjoy the WWII mysteries of Alan Furst, J. Robert Janes and Philip Kerr should especially savor this fine book.
