Red Orchestra: The Story of the Berlin Underground and the Circle of Friends Who Resisted Hitler

Anne Nelson's "The Red Orchestra" takes you inside the Nazi resistance --- and it's a real page turner!

Anne Nelson's book "The Red Orchestra: The Story of the Berlin Underground and the Circle of Friends Who Resisted Hitler" is one of the most engaging books I have read about this well-documented and painful period in our recent history. The book follows the fates of a group of friends and acquaintances living in Berlin who support each other's efforts, no matter how audacious or diminutive, to resist the Nazi takeover of Germany starting in the pre-war 1930s. Although this is without doubt a historical text, the narration reads more like a novel than a history book. Against a backdrop of suspense, we are drawn into the daily world of these underground resisters as they battle against Hitler and the Third Reich. Ms. Nelson's writing style is both unpretentious and captivating. One develops an intimacy with the real-life characters over the course of the book. The extraordinary collection of photographs which accompany the book (some formal, but many candid) literally bring the reader face-to-face with these courageous people. In the end, one can't help but to cheer on their anti-fascist actions and grieve their personal losses. A page turner, to say the least!

2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

This brilliant work finally tells the truth about normal people in Germany during the twelve years of Nazi power. After this book, it is no longer possible to equate the terms "German" and "Nazi," as the press here has done for 7

This book is a frank, absorbing, terrifying tale of ordinary people who did extraordinary deeds during the black days of the Nazi regime. The moral questions are starkly presented; the human strengths and failings of each central character, as the story inexorably unfolds, are heartbreaking. The reader, in the end of this brilliantly researched and written book, is compelled to ask oneself: What would I have done? Would I have crouched in trenches, hoping for the firestorm to pass over my head, doing nothing except trying to survive? Would I have risked the lives of my innocent children, my innocent family, and my friends by resisting the government? Having seen how easily Americans were intimidated by howls of "Unpatriotic!" during the Iraq invasion and war of 2002, one must wonder how many of us, in the place and time of the Red Orchestra members, would have risked torture and death at the hands of the government to resist it nonviolently?
This book should be read by every student in America, and discussed in schools. It is, in short, a book for the ages.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Anne Nelson does some heavy lifting in The Red Orchestra

The author of The Red Orchestra, Anne Nelson, does some heavy lifting. In order to give fuller meaning to the stories of individual Berliners who were part of a loosely knit group of Nazi resisters, she adroitly traces the history of the Nazi movement from its inception, through the war and even into the postwar period. Her subjects -- writers, actors, bureaucrats, laborers - are revealed through primary sources. This is decidedly not historical fiction; the author fleshes out the stories of individual resisters using letters, diaries, official records and oral histories. The book is highly readable and compelling. Perhaps the book's most important message, which is not directly expressed by the author, is about the perils of fascism, in any age. Truth-seeking individuals and institutions, in particular journalists, artists, writers and the courts as well, must be protected from government meddling and control.

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