Ratlines - Hardcover

Neville, Stuart

3.7

1,915 ratings by Goodreads

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1846557372 ISBN 13: 9781846557378

Publisher: Harvill Secker, 2013

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Shortlisted for the CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger for Best Thriller of the Year

'Right at the end of the war, some Nazis saw it coming. They knew that even if they escaped, hundreds of others wouldn’t. They needed to set up routes, channels, ways out for their friends. Ratlines.'

Ireland, 1963. As the Irish people prepare to welcome President John F. Kennedy to the land of his ancestors, a German is murdered in a seaside guesthouse. He is the third foreign national to die within a few days, and Minister for Justice Charles Haughey is desperate to protect a shameful secret: the dead men were all former Nazis granted asylum by the Irish government.

A note from the killers is found on the corpse, addressed to Colonel Otto Skorzeny, Hitler’s favourite WWII commando, once called the most dangerous man in Europe. It says simply: ‘We are coming for you. Await our call.’

Lieutenant Albert Ryan, Directorate of Intelligence, is ordered to investigate the crimes. But as he infiltrates Ireland’s secret network of former Nazis and collaborators, Ryan must choose between country and conscience. Why must he protect the very people he fought against twenty years before? And who are the killers seeking revenge for the horrors of the Second World War?

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Review:

"Ratlines is a belter: fast, furious, bloody and good" (Ian Rankin)

"Stuart Neville’s books just get better and better and Ratlines is simply superb. A shocking moment in history is the backdrop to a hugely gripping thriller" (Mark Billingham)

"Wildly entertaining, Ratlines is a superb mystery but in addition, a spotlight on a slice of Irish history largely ignored. This is a complex mystery told in the exceptional style that Stuart Neville has made his own. Jameson and Nazis, Irish rebel songs and Charles Haughey, it's a bold and brilliant blend" (Ken Bruen)

"Skilfully paced and absorbingly constructed, Ratlines is another carefully wrought, condemnatory blast of cold air aimed at Irish complacencies that makes for a cracking read" (Siobhan Murphy Metro)

"Stunning... a first-rate story that seizes the imagination, and never lets go" (Geoffrey Wansell Daily Mail)

Book Description:

The war has only just begun: Lieutenant Ryan is given the poisonous assignment of protecting a former Nazi sheltering in Ireland in this brand new thriller from rising star Stuart Neville.

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