The End of Hitler

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

This is a factual account of both the death of Adolf Hitler and the end of Nazi Germany. Perhaps, the most momentous event of the twentieth century is described and analysed in detail. It ought to be read by anybody interested in the age we live in.

What did you like best about this story?

I liked best the way in which Kershaw shows, how like scorpions, the Nazis continued to sting and kill even when the allies were in the next village. There was no making a deal with people like this.

Which scene did you most enjoy?

The end. The final end of Hitler's Germany and the debt we owe to all of the allied powers who defeated him.

If you made a film of this book, what would be the tag line be?

Gotterdmerung!

Any additional comments?

A brilliant tale told well.

7 people found this helpful

A tour de force

Excellent exposition of the führerprinzip and its central place in the destruction of Germany from the summer of 1944. Kershaw brings together the sad collapse of a people held in fear to the end.
I would have preferred a complete integration of the military and political aspects but perhaps max Hastings treatment of the ruination of Europe in the last year of the war is a good bedfellow.
The narrative is compelling with very few repetitions and the narrator strikes the right balance of gravitas and a lighter tone to deal with truly terrible facts that are laid before the listener. The retelling of the forced marches and the savagery of soviet retribution are particular standout episodes in this work.
Excellent.

4 people found this helpful

Narrator's voice - a problem

The Narrator of this books har a marvellous, light and vibrant speaking voice, and his range in volume from pianissimo (near inaudible) to fortissimo (you reach for the sound switch) is remarkable. He has, in short, an expressive, dramatic voice, that I would fint delightful in maybe reading poetry, children's stories, and many types of fiction.
But in a non-fiction history-book, written in a sober textbook-style, often with long sentences, this type of voice becomes distracting, and after a while quite tiresome and irritating, because it distracted me from the text I was interested in. I would not have bought this, had I known how distracting the narrator would become.

3 people found this helpful

Really informative

An excellant over-view, without the jingoism which seems to attach to so much German history as related by Brits. It happened and cannot be changed but the clarity of the why & how is frightenigly explained in a lesson to the wider world & to be hoped, we will learn something for mankind from it.

Well written,listenable & sensitive as I would expect from Prof Kershaw.

3 people found this helpful

Detailed but superfluous account

There are so many books on the Second World War that this tragic period has been extensively documented. Kershaw tries to distinguished his books from the others by just concentrating on the Germany side of the story, and giving only brief accounts of the fighting. The key revelation for me was how the July bomb plot allowed the Nazi regime to destroy any opposition, and allowed them to take Germany to their nihilistic end. What the author does is concentrates on how the war affected the population, and how propaganda was used to make people believe there was no alternative to fighting till the end. For most people they adopted a passive stoicism, and try to keep a normal life going. I like the story of the high government official that wrote about the need to change monitory policy in the last months of the war. While there is obviously new research in this book I don't think it adds much to what we already know about the end of the war. I was a bloody mess, and the Nazi elite were callous brutes.

2 people found this helpful

Brilliant

Very interesting and informative. The pace is very well thought out and it keeps you interested. I really enjoyed this.

2 people found this helpful

Brilliant writing

A great book. I was unable to stop listening. Shocking , unreal but superbly worded. A must have for all.

1 person found this helpful

Kershaw..brilliant as ever

excellent for novices and experts alike. this isn't a military history and those unfamiliar with the course of ww2 might benefit from some pre study before r
reading.

1 person found this helpful

Interesting and necessary

If you like the subject: Second World War this is a good one to start or put on your list.

Tragedy

Kershaw takes us from the summer of 1944 to spring 1945 to show how the fanaticism of Nazi leadership prolonged World War 2 by several months, resulting in hundreds of thousands of deaths that could have been avoided had Hitler and his team accepted that defeat was inevitable and surrendered to the Allies. The main victims were the German people who saw their society collapse. A gripping read of a 20th c tragedy of epic dimension.