This might be good the way that Henry Miller might be good, or the way that Andrew Dice Clay might be funny, but sadomasochistic Holocaust revenge porn is not for me, even if it shows some cleverness in its design, is self-referential, and has footnotes. ( )

I don't really know what to make of this one. It starts as an alt_hist, where the Communists won the elections in Germany in 1933 and rounded up the Nazis into internment camps. a few of them escape to England and become small-time gangsters, thugs, people-traffickers, or end up on the fringes of Moseley's resurgent Blackshirts. All except for Hitler, who works as a private eye under the name of Wolf, because he thinks he's better than all his old, degraded comrades and is standing up for justice. There is a lot of violence, anti-semitism, misogyny, and sado-masochistic sex. It's totally sordid.
Then there are other passages apparently from out timeline where a Jewish man is trying to survive in Auschwitz. He used to write pulp fiction so presumably he's the man "dreaming" the alternate timeline, but it's hard to be sure.
It's an unpleasant story, but I felt compelled to read to the end to find out what happened, so I guess it worked. ( )

An utterly compelling, frightening, lurid, and unique story taking place in an alternate 1939 London, where Adolf Hitler, going by the name Wolf, is working as a Chandleresque private eye after escaping from a Germany where Communists won the 1933 election. Tidhar's book works on so many levels--as a holocaust story (the man who lies dreaming); a violent and twisted detective story; an alternate history where Oswald Mosley's fascists win the 1939 election and Britain takes a turn to the far right (and Tidhar has a wonderful hallucinogenic paragraph where the Shard, the London Eye, and other landmarks of the future are briefly seen but are understood not to exist in the disastrous timeline of Mosley as PM); and maybe even premonitions of Brexit. Tidhar's prose is powerful and sometimes poetic. This novel stands with the two ones I have read before--Osama and Unholy Land--as an amazing triumph of an author's imagination, but it is probably easier to digest than those two, and with its links to a history more known to most of us, it manages to not only entertain and disgust, but also to move us and even amuse us a few times. Wolf is not meant to be sympathetic, but even he is capable of a few honest insights along the way to the novel's unpredictable conclusion. Brilliant--just read it. ( )

I did not enjoy this book, despite its ingenuity. An alternate history where the communists defeat the fascists in the early 1930s. The basic story is about a P.I. named Wolf in London, who is hired to find a missing girl, while a number of prostitutes are killed in his slummy neighborhood. I found the rising anti-Semitism and ethnocentrisim in England almost as appalling as Tidhar's obsession with genitalia. ( )

Wow. Certain novels are so rich that they beggar the imagination. This one dives deep into the hidden recesses of alternate histories and pure Noir pulp in a very satisfying romp. Or is it a transformative detective piece? SF, or a commentary on what it really means to be ... led by crazy ideas?

Let's say it. The big surprise. Wolf, the PI living in London, was actually the failed Socialist Party Leader from Germany who lost the election in '33. That's right. He is Hitler. And Germany is overrun by communists. And England seems to be full of his old cronies who have left him behind to become thugs on their own.

Rich, rich, rich stuff here. And it's a great noir, dealing with pride, being broken, Jewish employers, and lots of references to Hitler's book and the publishing industry. Failed book, I might add. :)

I had a great time. None of it was in your face or obvious except for the careful reader, except, perhaps, by the end of the novel, but that's not really the main point.

Oddly enough, I loved one aspect more than all the rest. Hitler's weird transformation into a Jew. It didn't happen right away and had lots of good reasons behind it, like being undercover, but SO MUCH happens that turns our history on its head and pours it all on this poor man... even making him sympathetic in a way... as he lives, learns, and through his embitterment, makes us feel.

I've read nothing like this. It is a class of its own. :) Not a satire. Indeed, rather careful, very mystery-oriented, and often disturbing, but not for the usual reasons. And then, the framing device of the dreaming man, living in a concentration camp... well, that's another added bonus that just makes me think and think. :)

Really enjoyable novel. And btw, it's tied to [b:Unholy Land|39791736|Unholy Land|Lavie Tidhar|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1531831184l/39791736._SY75_.jpg|61518815]. I would recommend reading [b:A Man Lies Dreaming|22793545|A Man Lies Dreaming|Lavie Tidhar|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1406124731l/22793545._SY75_.jpg|42337170] first. ( )