Wiseask’s review of Adiel and the Führer > Likes and Comments

Author Elyse Hoffman here. Normally would not reply to reviews because tastes vary and it’s fine to not like my book! But I wanted to correct a few things because I feel like there are a few misunderstandings:

Spoilers!


“Unfortunately, fantasies about time travel frequently raise paradoxical questions that less intellectual authors like Elyse Hoffman prefer to sidestep. Like how could Becca, alive in 1955, have died of natural causes in the 1930s? And why was Adiel’s brother Avi never born after his parents traveled back in time to the past? Especially since they traveled back in time specifically to save him.”


Core misunderstanding: as established by Asmodeus, when they went back in time they didn’t “combine” with their past selves, they arrived in the 1800s (well before they were born in real life) and remained trapped there, aging in their 20s/30s. So Becca died of natural causes in the 1930s because she was older than the version of her that went back to 1889 in 1955. Avi was still born to the past versions of Becca and Natan that would have been born in the 20s, but at that point the Time Travelers were effectively different people.


“But when I found midway through the book that the Plan B to prevent the Holocaust was resting on the rehabilitation of Final Solution architect and mastermind Reinhard Heydrich, I knew that the story was making a leap from moderately absurd to absolutely absurd.


Who knew, except for author Elyse Hoffman, that Reinhard Heydrich, the very personification of evil on earth with a goal to exterminate an entire people, actually had a heart of gold and a soft spot for Jews? Easy: Just show Heydrich some illustrated history books from the future about the Holocaust to convince him that, gosh, mass murder is maybe wrong after all. Conversion of a rabid antisemite and sociopathic killer has never been so simple!”


This is actually why I chose to reply to this review: I think you either didn't read the authors notes at the end or are basing this off an oversimplifed interpretation of a complex historical villain. As noted by most biographies about Heydrich (The Hangman and His Wife being one of the best, but Gunther Deschner’s book despite being older is also very good, I also recc Gerwarth's biography called Hitlers Hangman) Heydrich joined the Nazi Party after being booted by the Navy and did not become a loyal Nazi much less a violent anti-semite until two years into his SS career. Prior to that he would repeatedly call the Nazis "clowns" and exhibited no anti-semitism, even having good ties with some Jews. Heydrich is unquestionably an evil human being, but exploring what may have happened if he had an intervention BEFORE becoming an anti-semite is hardly rehabilitation.


I characterize Heydrich as selfish and foolish, who even confesses at the end to Leon that he’s going to Hell, and I certainly don’t think approaching him with historical accuracy to explore him as a character is whitewashing. Heydrich didn't emerge from the birth canal looking to exterminate Jews and even when he was sworn in to the SS, he certainly didn't go into that swearing in knowing he would have millions of people’s blood on his hands. If he had, it likely would have changed his opinion: there’s a reason the stages of genocide are stages, the perpetrator can't just be told “kill that race” and do it, it’s a frog in a boiling pot. Regardless: Heydrich’s character is based on very extensive research and I'm more than happy to recc the best biographies. I think oversimplifying historical antisemites pure monsters is dangerous as well as inaccurate: Heydrich is a disturbing character because he had specks of humanity and wasn't a sociopath and yet he still killed millions of people.


“And it rests on the mistaken assumption that the Holocaust depended on Hitler alone, and not on a totalitarian Nazi ideology with millions of followers feeding a compliant nation a constant diet of the most grotesque antisemitic propaganda dehumanizing and scapegoating the Jews as the cause of Germany’s misfortunes.”


I don't think I ever claimed Hitler alone is responsible for the Holocaust, it’s stated that Adiel can’t cancel the anti-Jewish laws because anti-semitism is too ingrained even absent Hitler. But Hitler is ultimately the Fuhrer and would have the authority to either start the genocide or not; he’s one man, but he has to give the order in order for everyone to demonstrate their anti-semitism by going along. No exact "Fuhrer Order" was ever located but most historians agree that doesn’t indicate that the Holocaust somehow was not ultimately Hitler’s decision (despite Goering's claim at Nuremberg).


“Even if that man was an incredible fictitious Hitler who the German nation was expected to believe had an impossible overnight change of heart about the Jews he had spent his entire adult life demonizing.”


A few things: Hitler didn't spend his entire life as an anti-semite, most historians place his anti-semitism as arising either during his homeless stint in Vienna when he was in his 20s or shortly after the first world war, which is the more accepted period. Second: as established in the book, Adiel’s Fuhrer still prosecutes Jews and does not pretend to have a change of heart, the only difference is he does not actively exterminate them, so he commits ethnic cleansing but not full genocide.


“P.S. I was wondering what happened to all those illustrated history books documenting the Holocaust that Natan and Becca had brought back with them from the future and which Reinhard Heydrich had found so persuasive? Did they simply disappear from future libraries and bookshelves because they were no longer history? Not surprisingly, the author never says.”


Adiel burns the books at the end of the book before Operation Chaplin, that's established at the end, the scene where Heydrich says “you’re ready.”


I’m sorry that you did not enjoy the book, but regardless, thanks for reading and reviewing!

The problem is that your book is based on the mistaken assumption that history can be changed, when of course it can’t, and pretending that it can is nonsense. I’m sorry, but the flaws I exposed in your storytelling are valid and are not based on misunderstandings. I understood perfectly well what you’re trying to do but it just doesn’t work. There are plenty of ways to seriously dramatize the greatest crime in history without reducing it to a fairy tale. Schindler’s List is an example of historical fiction about The Holocaust. What you wrote is not.

Wiseask wrote: "The problem is that your book is based on the mistaken assumption that history can be changed, when of course it can’t, and pretending that it can is nonsense. I’m sorry, but the flaws I exposed in..."

I respect your opinion even if I disagree: a lot of folks don't love the idea of historical fantasy and thats valid though it sounds more like you dislike the mere concept of a time travel story set in WWII regardless of the execution (which of course you're entitled to dislike for any reason you want, I was confused about the critique because I know the books content and know the mechanics of the time travel were explained, though again, I really responded more because of the Heydrich issue. I firmly don't want people to think I'm soft on the schmuck). I also think fantasy is a tool which one can use to explore history and ideas without constraint. I highly recommend Hasidic Tales of The Holocaust which inspired a lot of my work.
Also: I love Schindler's List but none of my books intend to be in that area of fiction. My genre is more serious historical fantasy. If you've ever seen Pan's Labyrinth very similar genre. I'd say I'm historical fantasy somewhere between that and The Book Thief. If you really hate that genre you're going to hate all my books. Still: I appreciate you stepping outside the genre and giving me a try even if it didn't sway you! Have a good one!

But in this book you are not using fantasy to “explore” history, you are using it to rewrite history, which has led you into numerous traps. I identified some (though not all) of them in my review.

Take the issue of the history books about the Holocaust that Adiel’s parents brought back in time with them. When I rhetorically asked in my review what happened to those books after Adiel changed history, your glib answer was that he had burned the books.

But since his parents only brought back one copy of each book, what happened to all the other copies that still existed in the future? Did they magically disappear from 1955 bookshelves and libraries when Adiel single-handedly reversed Nazi ideology and decided to simply “prosecute” (your word: perhaps you meant persecute) Jews instead of exterminating them?

You credit yourself with explaining the “mechanics” of time travel, but in all honesty there are none. Time travel is not a science, it is a fantasy, and using it as a vehicle to explain the supposed salvation of millions of Jews when in fact they were murdered, diminishes the enormity of the crime against them by eliminating it.

Claiming as you do that under Adiel the Jews still suffered without actually being mass murdered only serves to prove my point. That makes the Jews just like other victims of war instead of being the historically unique people tragically set aside for genocide.

"But in this book you are not using fantasy to 'explore' history, you are using it to rewrite history, which has led you into numerous traps. I identified some (though not all) of them in my review."

Not precisely: Adiel and the Führer is a work of alternate history, so it is less about rewriting history and more about exploring divergent points in history. Naturally, if that genre isn't your thing, that's valid, but using alternate history to examine historical personalities and what "made them" isn't rewriting history in the way Holocaust revisionism would be. Adiel and the Führer is more focused on answering the classic "would you kill baby Hitler" question, with a slight twist to add in a nature vs. nurture angle.

"...what happened to all the other copies that still existed in the future? Did they magically disappear from 1955 bookshelves and libraries...?"

Yes: that 1955 timeline ceased to exist when Adiel took power. Thus those books were never published and remain in the disintegrated original timeline. The initial point of the plan was, of course, to kill baby Hitler so that the Holocaust would never happen and the future would change. It worked, in a way, just not exactly as Becca and Natan intended.

"Time travel is not a science, it is a fantasy, and using it as a vehicle to explain the supposed salvation of millions of Jews when in fact they were murdered, diminishes the enormity of the crime against them by eliminating it."

I completely agree that time travel is total fantasy, though fantasy still requires consistent mechanics. Time travel is one of those things that never ends up squeaky clean, but if something were totally inconsistent or unexplained, that would be an error. Just because a genre is fantasy does not mean an author can just say "magic!" Rules still need to be in place.

Also, respectfully, as someone Jewish who studies the Holocaust extensively, I'm going to disagree about my diminishing the enormity of the Holocaust or turning Jews into just another victim group (which is, incidentally, a critique I recall being leveled against Sophie's Choice, since it was mainly focused on a Catholic victim of Auschwitz). Many, many works of fiction invent false scenarios or deviate from history to explore history and historical personalities. Doing so isn't saying the Holocaust never happened or was not unique. Once again, I highly recommend Hasidic Tales of the Holocaust or They Were Like Family to Me.

You're allowed to find the book distasteful, of course. That is all well and good! But again, I was really only interested in replying to the critiques that were mechanical or factual (based on history). If something is mechanically or factually wrong, after all, that is reason for revision.

Once again: we just seem to have different opinions on what is and is not explorable in fiction centered on the era. That's all well and good! If you happen to have specific factual or mechanical issues, I'd appreciate knowing about them, but respectfully, I don't want to engage further on a matter of taste or what is and is not all right to do in Holocaust fiction, since that's subjective and pretty hotly debated everywhere. Thanks for taking the time to read my book either way.

And thank you for taking the time to read and comment on my review.