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Description
We are in Prague, in 1942. Two men have been enlisted to kill the head of the Gestapo. This is Operation Anthropoid: two Czechoslovakian parachutists sent on a daring mission by London to assassinate Reinhard Heydrich - chief of the Nazi secret services, 'the hangman of Prague', 'the blond beast', 'the most dangerous man in the Third Reich'. His boss is Heinrich Himmler but everyone in the SS says 'Himmler's brain is called Heydrich', which in German spells HHhH. All the characters in "HHhH" are real. All the events depicted are true. But alongside the nerve-shredding preparations for the attack runs another story: when you are a novelist writing about real people, how do you resist the temptation to make things up? "HHhH" is a panorama of the Third Reich told through the life of one outstandingly brutal man, a story of unbearable heroism and loyalty, revenge and betrayal. It is improbably entertaining and electrifyingly modern, a moving and shattering work of fiction.
Laurent Binet talks about his book HHhH
Comments & Discussion
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annaTRR
I have recently read a few novels based on World War II events. Some of them such as The Street Sweeper and All That I Am have been absolutely outstanding! However it is while reading HHhH that I started to wonder how much does the accuracy of the events matter when writing a story like this? Is it really important that Heydrich's car was green or red or blue? I also wonder what other WWII fiction books have you found very powerful or thought provoking?
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Published reviews
Dear Mr Binet, I’d like to apologise to you for leaving HHhH sitting, unread, in my bedside bookstack for so long. Now that I have finished your book, I want to say, Phew!.....How could I have overlooked your book for so many months? It’s...
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Lady Luck commented:
When you have male family members who fought in WWI, WWII and Vietnam, you understand the importance of accuracy because it is insulting to them to get it wrong. They know, they can tell. In a way, it is subtly changing the course of historical events even if the smallest detail is inaccurate. This is where authors draw a fine line between fact and fiction and readers must realise certain details have been omitted or enhanced to make a good story. I find it very hard to read such war novels, perhaps because there's a personal edge.
annaTRR commented:
I think it is absolutely vital that the important facts are accurate, but I just wonder where should the line be drawn for the fictional accounts???. In the case of HHhH (which by the way I thought was a really interesting novel) the author questions himself on the validity of writing historical fiction at all. The actual example of the colour of the car was based on the fact that we only have black and white photos of that car. This means that the author is making an assumption that the car in which Heydrich travelled when he was ambushed was of certain colour but he cannot be sure. However, if the absolute historical accuracy was to be upheld in all fiction would readers of fiction only (and there are quite a few of them) ever heard about this story and so many others? What are the Second World War fictional titles that you have found particularly powerful?