Books like La disparition de Josef Mengele by Olivier Guez

"Oh my human brothers, let me tell you how it happened." So begins the chilling fictional memoir of Dr. Maximilien Aue, a former Nazi officer who has reinvented himself, many years after the war, as a middle-class family man and factory owner in France. Max is an intellectual steeped in philosophy, literature, and classical music. He is also a cold-blooded assassin and the consummate bureaucrat. Through the eyes of this cultivated yet monstrous man, we experience in disturbingly precise detail the horrors of the Second World War and the Nazi genocide of the Jews. During the period from June 1941 through April 1945, Max is posted to Poland, the Ukraine, and the Caucasus; he is present at the Battle of Stalingrad and at Auschwitz; and he lives through the chaos of the final days of the Nazi regime in Berlin. Although Max is a totally imagined character, his world is peopled by real historical figures, such as Eichmann, Himmler, Goring, Speer, Heyrich, Hoss, and Hitler himself.A supreme historical epic and a haunting work of fiction, Jonathan Littell's masterpiece is intense, hallucinatory, and utterly original. Published to impressive critical acclaim in France in 2006, it went on to win the Prix Goncourt, that country's most prestigious literary award, and sparked a broad range of responses and questions from readers: How does fiction deal with the nature of human evil? How should a novel encompass the Holocaust? At what point do history and fiction come together and where do they separate? A provocative and controversial work of literature, The Kindly Ones is a morally challenging read; it holds up a mirror to humanity — and the reader cannot look away.

Le 20 mai 1982, le grand reporter Hubert Lassier remettait à Paris Match, où il travaillait, un tapuscrit relatant une rencontre et un entretien avec Josef Mengele, au Brésil. Le fruit, selon lui, d’une traque de dix ans qui finit par aboutir, notamment grâce à l’aide d’Albert Spaggiari, réfugié en Argentine et ayant ses entrées dans les milieux d’extrême droite et des anciens nazis. Ce reportage-entretien ne fut pas publié à l’époque. Était-ce parce que le célèbre hebdomadaire suspecta un faux (Mengele est mort en 1979, pourquoi proposer cet entretien trois ans après ?) ? Ou parce que le contenu de l’entretien est parfois contraire à la vérité historique telle qu’établie par le Tribunal de Nuremberg ? Vrai ou faux, nous avons choisi de publier ce texte car il est captivant, tant par la traque de Mengele que par l’entretien accordé par ce dernier. Ainsi, allez-vous lire soit un entretien historique inédit avec un criminel de guerre sulfureux, soit le génial roman d’aventure caché de Lassier et de Spaggiari. À vous de juger... Grand reporter à Paris Match puis à VSD, Hubert Lassier périt, le 15 décembre 1995, dans un attentat qui fit exploser l’avion où il voyageait avec le chef touareg Mano Dayak (qui mourut lui aussi).

An autobiographical narrative in which the author describes his experiences in Nazi concentration camps, watching family and friends die, and how they led him to believe that God is dead.