I read this in paper format, so I cannot comment on the electronic version's layout, but this is a story that I'm glad was told. Stories like these are what breathe life into history classes! While we cannot get away from dates and names, of course, being able to add even a few facts from books like these to my students' lessons makes them much more interested -- even though they won't be tested on these additional facts.

Description
Revealed for the first time: how the SS rounded up the Nazis' most prominent prisoners to serve as human shields for Hitler in the last days of World War II

In April 1945, as Germany faced defeat, Hitler planned to round up the Third Reich's most valuable prisoners and send them to his "Alpine Fortress," where he and the SS would keep the hostages as they made a last stand against the Allies. The prisoners included European presidents, prime ministers, generals, British secret agents, and German anti-Nazi clerics, celebrities, and officers who had aided the July 1944 bomb plot against Hitler--and the prisoners' families. Orders were given to the SS: if the German military situation deteriorated, the prisoners were to be executed--all 139 of them.

So began a tense, deadly drama. As some prisoners plotted escape, others prepared for the inevitable, and their SS guards grew increasingly volatile, drunk, and trigger-happy as defeat loomed. As a dramatic confrontation between the SS and the Wehrmacht threatened the hostages caught in the middle, the US Army launched a frantic rescue bid to save the hostages before the axe fell.

Drawing on previously unpublished and overlooked sources, Hitler's Last Plot is the first full account of this astounding and shocking story, from the original round-up order to the prisoners' terrifying ordeal and ultimate rescue. Told in a thrilling, page-turning narrative, this is one of World War II's most fascinating episodes.

My Review

The book Hitler’s Last Plot is very well written. The author took the time to really research the points expressed here to make this a wonderful book. If you are a was buff, then this is the book for you. Although this is not typically the type of book I read, I must say I was intrigued to about Hitler.

This book was provided free of charge in exchange for my honest opinion.

I give this book a 4 star ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

"Hitler's Last Plot" eBook was published in 2019 and was written by Ian Sayer (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ian_Sayer) & Jeremy Dronfield (http://jeremydronfield.com/).  Mr. Sayer has published six books. Mr. Dronfield has published 10 books. 

I categorize this novel as ‘PG’ because it contains scenes of Violence. The story is set in Europe beginning in April of 1945. This is a dramatized account of what actually transpired. 

Europe had been invaded in June of 1944. The Allied forces were closing in on Germany. The US and British from the west and South, Russians from the east. Hitler initiated a last-ditch plan. There were several high profile people in German concentration camps. He ordered the SS to take those 139 prisoners from the camps. The plan is to use them as hostages and execute them if the Reich falls. 

This book tells the story of those prisoners and their journey through Germany, Austria, and Italy. They were constantly under threat of Allied air attack and were at risk from the SS troops that had them in custody. Their fate was in the hands of the fanatic SS on one hand and more rational Germans on the other. The prisoners were also helped along by partisans and finally rescued by US forces in the days after the official surrender. 

I enjoyed the 8 hours I spent reading this 327-page account from WWII. I had not heard about this incident before, so it was an interesting read. I was amazed by how much a few Germans assisted the prisoners, and at how lenient their SS captors were towards them.  I like the cover art. I give this novel a 4 out of 5.

Further book reviews I have written can be accessed at https://johnpurvis.wordpress.com/blog/. 

My book reviews are also published on Goodreads (https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/31181778-john-purvis).

The author's painstaking research and attention to detail is obvious in the writing of this book. There were many facts that I only discovered after reading this!

I received a free digital review copy from the publisher, via Netgalley.

In other World War II histories, I have seen references to various high-level prisoners of the Nazis during World War II, but this is the first book I’ve read that focuses exclusively on these so-called Prominenten, and the first time I’ve heard of the lunatic plot of Hitler and his top henchmen to use them as pawns in the war’s endgame.

The first half of the book focuses on introducing us to the motley crew of Prominenten and their locations before the plot went into motion. They included people from 22 different countries and a wide range of roles. The most prominent was Léon Blum, the prime minister of France before the Nazis defeated the country, and a particular target of the Nazis because he was Jewish and a socialist. Another top political leader was Kurt von Schuschnigg, the former chancellor of Austria, who was a fascist but offended the Nazis by daring to oppose the takeover of Austria by Germany.

Among the German Prominenten were important churchmen who had publicly opposed Nazism, and prominent citizens like Fritz Thyssen and Hjalmar Schacht, who had been enthusiastic supporters but became disenchanted with Hitler and the Nazi Party. There were more than a dozen “kin prisoners” who were relatives of the perpetrators of various plots against Hitler, such as von Stauffenberg, one of the principals of the so-called Valkyrie plot. More Prominenten included Russians and Greeks, usually high-level military officers.

English prisoners were mostly intelligence agents and RAF officers, including several who had made spectacular escapes from various Stalags. There were two men named Churchill, whom the Nazis incorrectly thought were related to Prime Minister Winston Churchill—but one of them was a top agent for British intelligence, so close enough.

Some of the Prominenten weren’t technically even prisoners. Astonishingly, the Nazis allowed some prisoners to have their wives and children join them—and even more astonishingly, a couple did just that. Most notably, Kurt von Schuschnigg’s wife, Vera, and baby daughter Elizabeth joined him.

Before 1945, the Prominenten were kept in different places, usually in fairly decent conditions in some corner of camps like Buchenwald, Flössenburg and Dachau. While the Nazis made efforts to keep the Prominenten away from view of their horrific treatment of other prisoners, it was impossible to keep them entirely in the dark.

As it became increasingly clear that Germany’s military situation was dire, Hitler and his inner circle came up with the idea of moving the Prominenten to a mountain lair in the Tyrol. They would be difficult for the Allies to rescue in that location, and the Nazis could use them as bargaining chips. If that was unsuccessful, they would execute them all. Hey, because that’s what the Nazis did. Even when it was absolutely clear that the war was lost, they kept killing prisoners as fast as they could, by outright execution, working them to death, and forcing them on pointless death marches.

Speaking of cruelty and futility, the authors describe in detail the efforts made by the Nazis to gather up the Prominenten from their various prisons and transport them to the Tyrol. For all the famed German efficiency and planning, the efforts to get all the Prominenten to the Tyrol were so screwed up it would be funny, except that every day the prisoners worried that their SS/SD escorts would simply decide it was all more trouble than it was worth and execute them.

I had an idea in my head that this would be the story of 139 Prominenten taken to a secluded mountain lair and living in tense isolation. Not at all! What with the Allies advancing all the time, partisans emboldened, refugees cramming the roadways, various cease fires called and broken, Niederdorf, where the Prominenten ended up, was awash with all sorts. The Wehrmacht and the SS were at odds over the prisoners and in all the tumult, prisoners were often allowed to stroll about the village and socialize. Some very odd friendships were struck up, many of which survived the war. Kurt von Schuschnigg even came to admire Léon Blum. And outside the village, in the chaos there are competing forces coming for the prisoners. Some to rescue them, some to move them, some to execute them.

There is just so much going on in the book that it can make your head spin, but the authors do a good job describing quite a few of the Prominenten, so that the reader feels invested in their fates. The authors also convey the absolute chaos of the last days of the war, when desperation, the desire for revenge, carelessness and the breakdown of clear military authority made the fate of the Prominenten balance on a knife’s edge.

A well-researched and readable history of a little-known episode in World War II.

Fascinating story about a little-known series of events at the end of WWII. VIPs taken to a mountain redoubt as human shields for a last stand, a confrontation between the German army & the SS, and an Allies mission to rescue the hostages are just the main story - the author brings the story to live through the details. Highly recommended.