Nonfiction – History
Released May, 2011
466 Pages
Bottom Line: Read it.
Affiliate Link: Buy from Amazon
Source: Purchased

Plot Summary

Told through the eyes of Martha Dodd, the US Ambassador to Berlin’s daughter, Larson paints a picture of how the German people remained oblivious as Hitler very gradually accumulated the power to enable him to pull off the Holocaust under their noses.

My Thoughts

In the Garden of Beasts tackles Hitler and the Holocaust from a totally different angle than the one in the history books (at least the ones I studied in school). He was able to capture how Hitler and the Third Reich managed to convince the German population that he was the best leader for their country and that he and his fellow Nazis did not have more sinister motives. A brilliant P.R. coup.

Martha Dodd loves to party and hangs out with numerous sketchy characters – including many prominent Nazi party officials, which adds intrigue to the more historical aspects of the story.

Larson also covers how William Dodd’s (the U.S. Ambassador) many warnings of the Third Reich’s increasingly alarming actions went generally unheeded by the U.S. State Department.

In the Garden of Beasts is a fascinating look at Hitler’s rise to power while the rest of the world sat on their haunches and is on my Book Club Recommendations List.