Major (Karl) Plagge was responsible for saving Jewish and Polish people during WWII, including the author's mother. In this book, he relates his journey to find recognition for Plagge and the result.
I had some issues with the book itself. The author was repetitive and could have used a good editor. I'm also someone who looks at sources. This makes it so I have way too many books to read, but I was looking at the footnotes. For the "book" (the part I'd consider the first edition), the sources were listed as documents on a dead website or to memoirs that didn't seem to exist. After the epilogue, I saw mention of a website searchformajorplagge.com. As of writing this review, that website is current and has all the articles and memoirs on it.
The other strange thing was the way the book was structured. The first third of it was more of a history of the author's family. The "search" didn't start until around 28% and then stopped around 55% (I use a Kindle and measure my progress through percent). After that, he spent 7 or 8% on a man who worked with Plagge (and that was the "epilogue" at 60%). There were also two sections of pictures in there randomly. I also didn't understand why he felt the need to include every detail of every letter/email like From: To: Re: - not sure that was necessary.
I found the most interesting parts of the book were the denazification trial (Appendix A) and whenever the author was quoting a direct source (memoir, letter, etc.). Karl Plagge was an interesting man, and I was glad for the glimpse into who he was. I would recommend for anyone wanting to learn about him to check out the website. I appreciate the author's journey and the good work he did bringing light to Plagge. He also brought together survivors and people that needed to heal. While I can appreciate that, I wish the book had been better structured.
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