Member Reviews
I really didn’t like this book. Couldn’t get into it. Or understand what made it get published. Feel like the author is trying to get a hit off a huge name drop like Hitler!! Guaranteed to have people stop and read. But to succeed and have a hit you need more than that. This book was lacking
When I came across this book, "Married to Hitler" while browsing the Netgalley website of ARC (advance reader copy) books available for free in exchange for an honest & unbiased review, it was the title that first caught my eye — and then, once I read the accompanying blurb, I knew that I just HAD to get it. Especially since, just like the publisher's description says about Adam Levin, the main character in this book, in many ways, I too feel like I'm "married to Hitler", or at least married to the Holocaust and the experiences of its victims & survivors. Because the Holocaust is a subject that I've always been extremely interested in (some family members have even called it an “obsession") ever since I was around 9-10 years old. That was when I saw some of the concentration-camp scenes in the "War and Remembrance" TV miniseries (based on the book by Herman Wouk) as well as read some passages (and skimmed through others or the rest!) of Viktor Frankl's book "Man's Search for Meaning" around the same time — and it had a profound effect on me. Although it gave me terrible nightmares for awhile, it sparked a very deep & lifelong preoccupation with the Shoah (another term for the Holocaust)
In fact, I've literally lost count of how many memoirs, novels, and other books about the Nazi era/genocide that I've read, and in some cases, re-read (even multiple times!) and how many movies/films about it that I've seen. In fact, I don't think a single month or week has gone by when I've not seen, read, looked up or thought about the Holocaust or someone (like Anne Frank) or something related to it. Not only that but pretty much ever since I first learned about the Shoah, I have longed to make a pilgrimage of sorts to Europe to visit as many as possible of the concentration camps, extermination camps, and massacre sites (like Babi Yar in Kiev, Ukraine, the Ninth Fort in Kovno, Lithuania and other places where the Einsatzgruppen murdered thousands, even tens of thousands in mass shootings, hangings, carbon monoxide gas vans, and being buried alive) in order to honor & pay respects to the victims, especially those who have no family or relatives left alive to commemorate them. In other words, although UNLIKE the protagonist, Adam Levin, I do NOT have an obsessive hatred of all things German (though I DO have that hatred for Adolf Hitler & the rest of the Nazis, as well as anti-Semitism, white supremacy, eugenics, Christian supremacy, Islamophobia, sexism/misogyny, homophobia, transphobia, racism and other prejudice & bigotry in general) nevertheless, if there is something EVEN MORE than being "married to Hitler" or more specifically "married to the Holocaust" that would probably describe me, at least to some degree.
Which is why, when the title of this book first caught my eye (and attention!) and I read the blurb, I knew I had to get it, and was automatically convinced I would LOVE this novel. Unfortunately, as I started reading, I wasn't impressed, and initially I was even planning to give it just 1 star, largely due to being turned off by BOTH the disgusting, unnecessary (and as far as I know, totally baseless!) claims about the sexual proclivities, preferences & predilections of Adolf Hitler and Eva Braun, his lover (and eventually, his wife, for the last 24 hours they spent on Earth) which to me felt like I was reading an issue of the National Enquirer or some other trashy tabloid AS WELL as the "sluttishness" of Adam and Zoe who had sex within HOURS (if even that!) of first meeting. Although I myself am asexual (and a virgin) and was raised with the belief/attitude/morals that sex is special and a big responsibility that should shared by those in a loving and COMMITTED relationship, meaning ideally reserved for after marriage, I am NOT a prude. I realize that not everyone wants or is able/willing to get married or be in a committed relationship before having intimate relations, and while I think they have every right to do so (hell, I think even consensual adult prostitution [NOT child prostitution or sex slavery, but prostitution between 2 totally willing & consenting adults] should not only be 100% legalized but even UNIONIZED!) personally I don't approve and think its really trashy & cheap for anyone to sleep with a person they just met an hour or two or few earlier. So, both of the primary characters doing that really disgusted me, and I was just about ready to give up, write a 1 star review and leave it at that. Yet, I don't know what or why, something told me to keep reading, perhaps hoping, just as the publisher's description of the novel said, that Adam Levin must divorce himself from Hitler — and that, by extension, it'd help me as well, to divorce myself (or at least separate myself) from the pretty much constant obsession of the Holocaust that I've had since 1987-88 and the age of 9-10.............but despite that it was of no use for that, once I'd finished the book, for the most part, I was glad I'd read it.
"Married to Hitler" was relatively short, and thus, a fairly quick read — and although it ended kind of abruptly for me, and the "solution" that came about for Adam Levin to divorce himself from his obsession with & hatred of all things German would not work/be applicable to me since I do NOT have a hatred of anything German (well, except for Hitler & the Nazis themselves, along with Neo-Nazis and Nazi sympathizers in general, whether German or otherwise!) it is an interesting story nonetheless. While the protagonist, Adam Levin DOES come off as a jerk and totally full of himself, as other Netgalley reviewers mentioned, especially in the beginning, by the same token, he DOES, in my opinion, eventually improve/get better and is NOT as bad as he used to be (and maybe is even good!) by the end of the novel.
All in all, the beginning of the story notwithstanding, I still really liked, maybe even loved "Married to Hitler"!
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 4 STARS!!!!!!!!!!!
When I requested this book via Netgalley it was because the premise sounded interesting but the book itself did not deliver for me. The main character was unlikable and came off as full of himself in fact abit of a jerk.
Many thanks to Netgalley for this ARC all views are my own.
Married to Hitler by Michael Rockland was a book that I read in one sitting. It was a fast read due to being short in length.
Initially I DNF’d this book but went back, hate DNF-ing, and I still feel the same.
The premise sounded interesting but the book itself did not deliver for me. The first few chapters went by so fast they didn’t feel to me like they were setting up much thus it was hard to stay with the story. The main character is unlikable, full of himself, and I think was meant to be likably neurotic but came off as jerk. And the dialogue felt stiff at times, like robotic and unvaried as if characters needed to speak simply to communicate. And finally, the cover makes little to no sense, I picked this up based on the title and blurb and just can’t with that cover.
I wanted to like this, really did, but couldn’t.