"Horses of anger trampling, horses of anger Trampling behind the sky in ominous cadence / Beat of the heavy hooves like metal on metal / Trampling something down...." James Forman's novel re-creates the dark, evil days in Germany when the curse of Nazism hung over that land, when boys like Hans Amann had to fight like men for a cause some were beginning to doubt.
Hans spends his fifteenth birthday in 1944 firing at American bombers from a tower near Munich, though he and the three other boys in his crew know the bombers are far out of range of their antiaircraft gun. But Germany is beginning her last, desperate stand, the Nazi grip is tightening, and Hans must obey the unreasonable orders of his commander to fire blindly into the sky. Though the four boys have once been classmates, it is only under the stress of war days that they begin to understand one another and to see how differently each is reacting to the Nazi philosophy so relentlessly drilled into them.
As the nights of raiding continue, Hans recalls earlier, happier birthdays and worries about his family: his parents, trying to cope with wartime shortages and keep out of trouble with the Gestapo, yet knowing that unbelievably evil things are going on in Germany; Uncle Konrad, the army hero embittered by the exile and death of his Dutch Jewish wife, typical of the disillusioned officers who plotted against Hitler late in the war; wise and gentle Gretchen, who came to the Amanns a homeless refugee and in the end brought peace of mind to both Hans and Konrad.
During the six-year war each of them changes and Hans himself grows to the point where he can accept and even welcome the German defeat as the end of a nightmare and the hope of a new life. James Forman has written a forceful, positive novel about times and events we cannot afford to forget.
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