Book Review: The Dirks Escape, by C. Brandon Rimmer

I'm going to be a little more cautious with this review than I've been on others, because I don't want to denigrate the families that experienced this awful situation.

First, the cover:

I'm an absolute sucker for World War II nonfiction, particularly Holocaust literature. And the word "Holocaust" certainly appears on the cover of this book.

However.

The Holocaust -- the actual Holocaust -- is mentioned in passing in this telling. But the characters are certainly not "fleeing from the specter of the Holocaust." They are a family of German Lutherans fleeing the Soviet occupation of East Germany, yes, but the Holocaust plays no role whatsoever in their story.

I imagine -- I hope -- this was more of a marketing trick on the part of the publisher than a misdirection of the part of the author, but you never know.

So take that in mind as you read this book.

Told as a tale of a family fleeing Soviet occupation, this story works. Like many functionaries who were even moderately successful during the War, Gerhard Dirks was a member of the Nazi party, though it's made clear on some kind of Scientology level that his membership was more perfunctory than ideological, at least as it's presented in the book. Nevertheless, live under occupation would not have been pleasant, so Nazi or not I'd have want to have left as well.

There was a lot more telling in this book than showing, which makes it a bit harder to read. This might be more of a service to the books' intended audience (it's also sold as a conversion to Christianity from atheism, and is reviewed by Billy Graham on the back cover). The audience might not want a more vivid telling, as is typical in about 99.9% of the World War II books I've read.

So a good read, but go in with lower expectations than the cover might demand.

Also, Rimmer: