I expected to like this from all the reviews I read about it but was still surprised by how into it I got. Not really much like anything else I ever read. Maybe The Alienist a little bit? Really involving, dark psychological suspense-mystery with a historical setting. definitely different.I will look for more by this author.

Let's not belabor this, The German was not a pleasant read. I'm not sure I expected it to be but I did expect to feel more of a connection to the characters than I did and for it to be less one-note.The German a.k.a. Ernst Lang is a German ex-pat living in Barnard Texas in 1944 after having served his country's military and suffered the traumatic effects of such. He's also a queer man living in a small town that's bigoted, highly conservative and has a pedophile serial killer in its midst, one w...

The German is an accomplished, gut-wrencher of a novel. Ernst Lang is a former German soldier who fled the Nazis and relocated to a small town outside of Austin, TX. The year is 1944 and someone is killing boys and leaving pro-Nazi notes in the victims mouths. The locals quickly display an all too familiar and realistic display of xenophobia and homophobia in accusing/confronting Lang and other Germans who live in the area.Lee does a fantastic job with wide cast of characters and shifting POVs,

Would love to read this, but it's not available in the UK for the Kindle and the paperback is very expensive.Update: Have discovered that this book is available in the UK on the Kindle, but the Kindle version doesn't show up Amazon when you bring the paperback up. I did manage to stumble across it by accident and really enjoyed the book.

This was my first book by Thomas, and he reminded me a bit of Jack Ketchum. He doesn't avoid the gruesome stuff and keeps your, sometimes unwilling, eyes glued to the pages, in spite of everything on the pages. This book was tightly plotted and had great character-development. I couldn't figure out whether I liked Ernst or not; maybe he deserved what happened to him. I'll leave that for you to decide. An excellent read.

The German by Lee Thomas (Lethe) is a chilling, well-told novel about a mysterious German ex-soldier living in a small U.S. town during the height of World War II, when tensions and suspicions are at a peak against German refugees, and even citizens of German ancestry. Who better to scapegoat for the brutal murder of a young man than a foreigner, who is also considered a sexual deviant?

It is not a romance. I have to capitalize it. If you don't like mysteries, skip it. But it's also not a typical crime mystery. If you have a look at the Awards this book has won, you can more or less imagine, what you CAN expect from this book. BUT probably all your expectations would be wrong.The plot is set in 1944, in Barnard, a small provincial town in Texas, with a small German community of old and new immigrants. In spite of WWII, the relationship between the residents of American and Germ...

First things first, goodreads has for some reason indicated this book belongs to the genre 'mm romance'. I cannot stress how much I do not want to have a discussion about the rise in popularity of mm romance in recent years, how as genres rise in popularity books that really ought to fall outside them become identified with them, either deliberately to boost sales, or more haphazardly as reflects the essential fuzziness of human made categories, I most especially do not want to discuss the relat...

Ernst Lang is a middle-aged German immigrant living in a small Central Texas town during the last years of WW II. In 1933, Lang was executed in Munich during HItler's purge of those Stormtroopers whose devotion to the "socialism" of National Socialsm was proving to be a problem. Lang, after being shot three times in the chest, found himself a night later standing naked beside his grave. A resourceful and trained soldier, he got himself from Munich to New York, then New Orleans and finally to Tex...

Excellent novel of redemption and trial. A reminder that justice never comes on the heels of a mob.

09/03/2019 I'm bumping this up a bit.I finish this too late last night and I feel like the coin just dropped this morning. I have this knot in my throat and just want to cry. The German definitely messed up with my brain and heart. It makes us look at our imperfections as a human race with nos masks. If behaviour could have been pictured, we would be quite ugly.08/03/2019**** 4.5 Stars ****I was drawn to The German from the first page.There is no waste of words. Crisp writing, honest, confident,...

This is a book that will stay with me, UNFORGETTABLE. I listened to the audible and the narration was fantastic. A historical suspense story told from three different perspectives. In Barnard TX in 1940 during WWII a serial killing has harsh impact on all. A Texas town with a large population of residents with German origin. A mystery IMO the story focused on the divided communities and how quickly they turned on each other. Lee’s writing from the viewpoint of the German (for me) was the most im...

A well written morality tale of how rational fear and ignorant bigotry can create a perfect storm of mindless violence that lays waste to the guilty and the innocent alike.Highly recommended.

4.5 stars. Very good historical gay suspense/horror set in small-town Texas during WWII, when the brutal murder of two boys has emotions running high against the Germans in town. Be prepared for a very disturbing read.

It took me a good while to read this book, since I started it in July 2011 and finished it in December! In my defence I wasn’t reading it all the time, I don’t read that slowly, honest. It was that I was expecting it to all go a lot darker than it did (although it does go to some dark places) and I’m happy that my anticipation didn’t match what actually happened. Although, as I say, it’s not full of fluffy rabbits.Ok, so basically it’s set in 1944 in a smallish Texan town and is told in three di...

Whoa! Fantastic thriller/suspense. The German captured my attention with its bone chilling prologue set in Germany and once begun, I couldn't put it down. However, this fantastic thriller by Lee Thomas is set in a small town in Texas during WWII where two young men are found skinned and disemboweled with snuffboxes stuffed in their mouths and inside them, notes written in German. You can only imagine how the townspeople react, particularly since there is a small German community residing among t...

Gerry B's Book Reviews - http://gerrycan.wordpress.comI first spotted The German by Lee Thomas [Lethe Press, 2011] in the fall of 2011, but it is only recently that I got around the reading it. At first blush it appeared to be too dark to prompt my immediate attention—and it is quite dark in places—but overriding this is its insightful and uncompromising look at human nature, of which the gory violence is only a symptom.In his own words, Thomas describes it this way:Cruelty is not taught. It is

I read The German by Lee Thomas immediately after Boy’s Life by Robert McCammon, both were fantastic for different reasons and The German is altogether a much darker coming of age story. The story takes place in a small town called Barnard in Texas during the Second World War, as you would imagine the war casts a big shadow over even the smallest towns, patriotism is prevalent in a town with more than its fair share of German ex-patriots and like all foreigners, more than anything they just want...

A clear 5 stars for me and easily one of the best thrillers that I've read in recent memory. An exquisitely paced novel that hits hard right off the bat and keeps landing blows until the flip of the last page. I'm going to be ruminating on this one for a while. Lee Thomas is an absolute force.

This is a great read. As it goes on the plot is a little predictable with some cliché characters and tropes but it doesn’t really detract from the plot. The story draws you in and the journal format of the book gives it a unique narrative. I was a bit disappointed in the ending before the time jump and really wanted a bit more closure. Regardless, it is a great read that just flows forth.