The Sins of the Innocents Book

Disclaimer: Because my review may seem to indicate that I favor one side or another, and I don't want readers to lose my point, I feel obligated to state the obvious up front -- The wholesale slaughter that took place under the Third Reich during World War II is utterly deplorable. Okay, on to my review.

My review changed radically as I read this book. I started with four stars because the subject matter was interesting and the first few "interviews" provided fresh insights into the minds of women living under the Third Reich. As I reached the middle of the book, I dropped my review to three stars because of redundancy, and the interviews were becoming more difficult to read. This book could've used a few more trips to an editor's desk to get rid of repetitious and extraneous material. For example, the author said she wanted to capture the authentic feel of each woman's interview, their regional style of speaking or manners, but that became irrelevant very quickly in light of what they were saying. And unless you're thoroughly familiar with the importance of the nuances of regional German colloquialisms, who cares? Indeed, all that style often rendered the text nearly incomprehensible. And perhaps that's exactly what the author wanted -- to make these women seem incomprehensible as they tried to explain their point of view. As she pressed forward with her loaded questions, the author carefully noted every stutter, pause, and restart as if that must lend weight to the point she wanted to make, that all these women have guilty consciences even if they won't admit it. Again and again the author said she was overcome by emotion and could barely continue the interviews. Again and again she tried to force these women into admissions of guilt. In fact, the entire book is an exercise in some kind of torturous game of "Gotcha!" perpetrated by the author on these elderly women, often with the aid of too much alcohol.

From the beginning, the author did not approach the subject with any kind of objectivity, with no sense there could, indeed, be another side to the story. If we adopt the author's way of thinking, simply by virtue of living in Germany under the Third Reich, there is no question all these women are guilty of murder, and the ones who resisted and helped others had not done enough. To be fair, she does credit a couple of the women with acts of goodness and yet sneers at their claims that they didn't know what was going on in the death camps. After brow beating her subjects from cover to cover she cops out in her conclusion by saying the issue is both simpler and more complex than most people realize. Yeah, no duh. Wasn't that what your book was supposed to explore? By the time I got to the last page I was thoroughly disgusted with the author, her methods, and her conclusion and so, while I was tempted to drop my review to two stars, I don't want to imply that I think people should avoid this book, so I'll leave it at three.

Now, having said all that, the salient point which the author failed to find or articulate clearly in all this is "what would I do in a similar situation?" That is the meat on this bone, not assigning guilt to a bunch of old ladies, but rather looking at how we might avoid being sucked in by a corrupt government ourselves. How do we raise our children to identify moral corruption in their world? How do we prepare them to stand firm against it? How do we prepare them for the idea they may have to face death for doing what is right? If a reader wants to take the time to glean some moral lessons from this book, this is a rich resource. If readers are looking for fair-handed coverage of the title subject, this book disappoints.