4.5 stars. A compelling mystery with a likable protagonist, intriguing plot line, and a sense that things aren't going to end well for our star-crossed lovers. This book dives into the chilling history of Nazi Germany and the repercussions that are still evident. Henri Poincaré is investigating his family friend's past during the Holocaust, and discovers the man was once interred at a steel mill/concentration camp, living in horrific conditions. The problem? The mill was run by his current girlfriend's father.
The Tenth Witness was captivating and heartbreaking. I heartily recommend it for all mystery and thriller fans. English (note: this was an ARC)
Given that this is a prequel, I wasn't quite sure what to expect, but this was a fabulous book. Digging deeply into questions of guilt by association, the aftermath of war and its corresponding guilt for all who are left behind, and how we handle serious ethical dilemmas, especially when they impact our livelihood and our relationships, and combining those themes with a solid storyline, Rosen has produced a great follow-up to All Cry Chaos, which I loved. Poincaré's character becomes even more layered, as some of his back story is revealed. I look forward to future books with these characters. Mystery, Thriller Hiking the flats of the Wadden Sea can be hard work and dangerous, but author Leonard Rosen provides a wise guide in Liesel Kraus for his character, Henri Poincare. There’s a haunting appeal to heading out over land often covered by water, to see what’s really there, to take on a challenge and get away from the business of everyday life. But Poincare, having tested his physical limits on the walk, soon finds his intellect and emotions tested too, as his life and Liesel’s become more intertwined.
A beautiful German home and a thriving German business provide the backdrop for much of this novel. If business associates live in Argentina, well, that’s not so strange; many Germans moved there after the war. And if Henri’s adopted uncle might almost have known Liesel’s father, that’s just the sort of pleasing coincidence that makes them seem made for each other. Except that Henri’s uncle was Jewish. When his uncle dies, the boy who loved his imaginative stories sets out across his own Wadden Sea to find the truth of a holocaust survivor’s hidden depths. The journey’s harder and more dangerous than he expects.
Convincing science, history and geography anchor this tale, giving it depth and power. Vividly haunting descriptions of mudflats, Hong Kong harbors, third-world laborers and first-world affluence tie the start of the computer age to a darker time before. And Liesel and Henri’s parallel searches into the past bring as many surprises as the hunt for shipwrecked treasure.
The older Poincare was a fascinating protagonist in Leonard Rosen’s earlier novel, All Cry Chaos. Here he’s convincingly youthful and idealistic, a young man learning that hidden things can be dark, sticky and hard to clean off as the Wadden Sea’s mud, but can still hold treasure. It’s a treasure of a novel.
Disclosure: I was sent a free preview edition by the publisher with a request for my honest review.
9781579623197 Stunning novel that is a prequel to Rosen's All Cry Chaos. This fascinating story takes us back to the 1970s and the continuing aftermath of the Holocaust - its survivors and its perpetuators, decades later. Rosen's protagonist French engineer Henri Poincare is just starting his career and encounters the moral complexity of doing business with Germans who may have had a hand in the making of the Nazi war machine. Rosen is a superb writer who deftly provides a taut and surprising plot that provides deep insight into his characters, the European landscape of survivors of the Holocaust and the Nazi regime, and ethical dilemmas that remain very current. For Poincare, this reveals his early background and first contact with Interpol.
Now, I must read All Cry Chaos at once! Highly recommended for readers who enjoy intelligent thrillers threaded with fine historical research. English This was a thoroughly remarkable, incredible read written on an staggering event that should never be forgotten (and in many cases has yet to be explained)! The book was well researched with a lot of historical realities which need to always be remembered and forgiven as everyone takes accountability for what transpired and hopefully will never happen again. And yet, as the author points out, we’re all guilty in one way or another of evil occurrences every day in our own lives! The story was well written, well plotted and ended with me thinking of what happened, how it happened, and hopefully never happens again! A real good thinking book! Mystery, Thriller
(Although published later, this is actually a prequel to All Cry Chaos.)
On the night of October 9, 1799, the frigate HMS Lutine breaks apart on the shoals of the Frisian Islands off the dutch coast. When the insurer Lloyds of London pays on the wreck, it takes ownership and plans expeditions to recoup the lost millions in gold and silver. Nearly two hundred years later, after a series of largely failed salvage operations, Lloyds tries again - this time on the strength of new technologies and a strategy devised by the gifted young engineer Henri Poincare.
It is late spring, 1978. Poincare has worked to near-exhaustion preparing for the Luntine dive. Before the salvage season begins, he takes a rare holiday: a hike at low tide across the vast, muddy flats of the Wadden Sea. His guide is Liesel Kraus - smart, able appealing...and troubled. She and her brother Anselm, directors of Kraus Steel, are haunted by a violent history that generates both rage and an enormous, corrputing wealth. The closer Poincare draws to Liesel and Anselm, the more warped life becomes until love and a death threat compel him to investigate what no one else - aside from Interpol - will. Pain as well as treasure, he discovers, can be dredged up from the past to reshape the present.
The Tenth Witness, a prequel to the award-winning , is the tale of a man upended: a twenty-eight year old who rejects a brilliant career in engineering for an uncertain, darker one: international police work. The Tenth Witness (Henri Poincare Mystery, #2)
3.5 stars.
This was mystery, historical fiction, modern treasure hunters, family history & WWII. I like all of those things. This was creatively written. The author tied everything together so neatly into this story. It also had some great twists that kept me engaged.
I liked the MC and some of the older characters. But I had a hard time with the main female character. She wasn't as well drawn as the others. Even the characters with minor roles, were better fleshed out. And the romance didn't work for me. It just seemed too simplistic and choppy. I had a hard time even picturing those two together, without any effort or understanding. 288 Good solid plot driven novel which is both a strength and weakness as Henri Poincare in this second offering of the franchise is flat. I think too that I am a little read-out and filmed-out with WW2 Holocaust material. I know it's probably politically incorrect, But I get it! We should never forget either that iteration or it's contemporary manifestation(s) in various global theatres. However the dearth of material / focus upon this era runs the danger of indifference or worse still a belief that it is the only matter of the type worthy of documenting in fiction, non fiction and all matters of.literary - artistic expression. Hardcover I've lost count of how many novels I've read about the fingers of the ugly World War II past reaching into the present. It's a challenge to make a fresh story on this theme, but Leonard Rosen's The Tenth Witness shows he is more than up to the task.
The Tenth Witness is a prequel to Rosen's impressive and original first Henri Poincaré novel, All Cry Chaos. Most of the action in The Tenth Witness takes place in the late 1970s, before Henri has become an Interpol agent. Henri is an engineer, and he and his partner, Alec Chin, have just landed an exciting project: on behalf of Lloyd's of London, they've built a platform from which they hope to recover the 18th-century wreck of the Lutine, a ship that went down off the Dutch coast, laden with gold bars.
While out hiking, Alec meets Liesl Kraus, and their attraction is immediate. Liesl turns out to be a very wealthy young woman, the daughter of Otto Kraus, founder of Kraus Steel. Henri is soon introduced to Liesl's family, including her charming brother, Anselm, who now runs the firm's operations, and her uncle, Viktor Schmidt, whose bluff heartiness feels to Henri as if its hiding something more menacing.
Henri, who has an honorary uncle Isaac who was a Jewish Holocaust survivor, is curious and cautious about the Kraus family, especially since Anselm and Viktor seem eager for Henri to become involved in some of their overseas businesses. Henri learns that Otto Kraus was a member of the Nazi Party and produced steel for the German war effort, with production fueled by slave labor. After Germany lost the war, Otto had a get-out-of-jail-free card, though: an affidavit, signed by 10 Jewish workers at Kraus Steel, swearing that Kraus had saved lives of the slave laborers; a veritable Oskar Schindler.
When hints surface that the whole Kraus-as-Schindler story might not be the real deal, Henri's love for his adoptive uncle compels him to try to unearth the truth, whatever the cost to himself, his career and his relationship with Liesl. The story really takes off at this point, with Alec traveling around the world gathering intelligence. Henri spends almost as much time slogging through archival documents, and Rosen's writing makes that part of the search every bit as tense and compelling as the globe trotting.
Henri's work and research take him to facilities in the third world where workers who are desperate for any kind of employment are treated only marginally better than the Nazi slave laborers, and to countries where individual freedoms and lives are sacrificed in the name of security and progress. Without being at all sanctimonious, Rosen makes us look at the situational ethics so many used during the Nazi era and ask ourselves if we are so sure we'd have done the right thing, not the expedient thingâ€"â€"and if the choices we make today can stand up to close scrutiny.
As with All Cry Chaos, there is so much going on in this novel; murder, romance, science and technology, a chase after Nazis, and the quest for a gold-laden shipwreck. The plotting is intricate but fast-paced, the storytelling lean but with plenty of food for thought and emotion.
Leonard Rosen has created an appealing and complex protagonist in Henri Poincaré, and his novels offer far more than the usual thriller or whodunnit. If you haven't read them yet, pick one and see for yourself.
Note: I received a free review copy of this book. Hardcover As indicated by the description, although written later than All Cry Chaos, it actually takes place earlier. This fills in some gaps in the character of Henri Poincare, great-grandson of his famous namesake, and is an even better story than the other. My rating is more like 3.5. Although there is much to be appreciated about the plot, the story sort of falls apart at the end. Still, I liked the book enough to round up to 4-stars. Mystery, Thriller Já jsem to hlavnÃmu hrdinovi prostÄ› nevěřil. Ani tu lásku, ani naivitu a autorovi to rozuzlenÃ. English
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