Appointment with the squire
By: Don Davis.
Publisher: Naval Institute Press
Published: 1995
Place of publication: Annapolis, Md
Language: eng
Number of pages: 327
Subjects: World War, 1939-1945 -- Fiction.
Description: Known for his nonfictional accounts of the most talked about murders of the 1990s, Don Davis takes a new direction with this book. He steps back in history and into the realm of fiction but continues to draw on his strengths as a researcher and storyteller. This action-packed thriller, set in the final days of World War II, takes us from the front lines in Belgium to Hitler's secret Bavarian lair and eventually to Warm Springs, Georgia, refuge of the president of the United States.

A crazed Fuhrer has schemed to deliver one final blow to the Allies that will reempower the Third Reich and throw its enemies into chaos.

To carry out his plan, Hitler sets loose an elite assassin from the SS named Wilhelm Mueller. The ruthless, combat-hardened commando relishes his mission because he nurses a hatred of the United States, the country of his birth where prejudice against Germans drove his family to ruination. En route to the United States he survives a dogfight over Germany, antisubmarine warfare in the North Atlantic, and treachery in the highest ranks of the Third Reich.

Assigned to hunt the Nazi down is a young intelligence officer, Jack Cole, the only American who can identify Mueller. Taken prisoner and left for dead in a BeIgian forest after Mueller used him for target practice, Cole has a personal score to settle and takes on the mission with vengeance. From Europe to Washington and across America, Cole finally hones in on his target in the backwoods of Georgia.

The sizzling manhunt is told against a masterfully realized background of secret operations, nerve-racking submarine and aerial warfare, and the inner workings of a government with an ailing but intractable commander-in-chief at the helm. Worked seamlessly into the narrative are periodic overviews of World War II developments and revealing glimpses into the legendary personalities of the time. The pacing of this taut thriller is superb, the ending a surprise to even the most sophisticated reader.