Munich (Movie Tie-in)

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The tie-in edition of the upcoming Netflix film starring Jeremy Irons as Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain—a spy thriller about treason and conscience, loyalty and betrayal, set against the backdrop of the Munich Conference of September 1938.Hugh Legat is a rising star of the British diplomatic service, serving at 10 Downing Street as a private secretary to the prime minister, Neville Chamberlain. Paul von Hartmann is on the staff of the German Foreign Office—and secretly a member of the anti-Hitler resistance. Years before, the two men were friends at Oxford. Now war is on the horizon and Chamberlain is desperately trying to maintain the peace. When Hugh is given a set of top secret German documents from an anonymous source, it is clear Hartmann is trying to get back in touch. As a result, Hugh is ordered to accompany Chamberlain to Munich. Meanwhile, Hartmann travels on Hitler’s overnight train from Berlin. Their meeting in Munich will change the course of the world affairs in ways that reverberate for years to come. Once again, Robert Harris gives us actual events of historical importance—here are Hitler, Chamberlain, Mussolini, Daladier—at the heart of an electrifying, unputdownable novel. INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER“Highly readable. . . . [E]ven more of a cracking good yarn than the real-life version.” —Jack Batten, Toronto Star 
“[A] nail-biting suspense novel that shines a whole new light on grey old Neville Chamberlain. In Harris’s clever plot, appeasement seems not only sensible but noble, albeit eighty years after the fact. . . . [T]he thrill here is in the minute details of diplomatic work and in Harris’s stunning reconstruction of how it all might have been. I couldn’t put it down.” —Margaret Cannon, The Globe and Mail 
“[A] brilliantly imagined thriller. . . . Harris’s cleverness, judgment and eye for detail are second to none. Because he writes with such apparent effortlessness, it is easy to underestimate his achievement, but his research is so impeccable that he could have cut all the spy stuff and published Munich as a history book. His portrait of Hitler, for instance—lazy, rude, sulking furiously at the German crowds’ enthusiasm for Chamberlain, reeking of sweat like a ‘workman who had not bathed or changed his shirt for a week’—is as good as anything you will find in Ian Kershaw’s definitive biography. The real star, though, is Chamberlain. Indeed, Harris’s treatment of Britain’s most maligned prime minister is so powerful, so persuasive, that it ranks among the most moving fictional portraits of a politician I have ever read.” —The Sunday Times 
“Robert Harris is on sure ground in this brilliantly constructed spy novel. . . . [A]gainst the intriguing backdrop of political machinations and brinkmanship is a thriller plot bursting to get out. . . . Harris is brilliant at depicting their world; prewar London, with its anti-aircraft guns, barrage balloons and searchlight batteries, is vivid, cinematic. Munich, too, is horrifyingly imperial, huge swastika banners on every building.” —The Observer 
“[G]ripping. . . . A master storyteller, with a forensic eye for detail—who knew that tiny steel swastikas adorned the taps in the lavatory on Hitler’s train?—Harris is a splendid writer. Every sentence is smooth. His beady observations of the main players are a joy.” —The Herald 
“We know Chamberlain was not prevented from signing the Munich Agreement, but such is Harris’s storytelling magic that the description of Paul’s mission is never less than riveting. In fact, the novel is unputdownable to the point of being dangerous: the house could have been on fire while I was reading and I wouldn’t have noticed.” —Daily Express (four stars)
 
“As always, Harris excels in close-focus scenes of history being written—or rather, scrawled, ripped up and redrafted—in a blur of small-hours wrangles, whispered rumours, midnight phone calls, sleepless vigils and cross-town dashes, amid a tobacco fug of fear, panic and confusion. . . . Defying hindsight, Harris generates a galloping sense of excitement and doom. . . . With moral subtlety as well as storytelling skill, Harris makes us regret the better past that never happened—while mournfully accepting the bitter one that did.” —Financial Times 
“It takes a historical novelist of the calibre of Robert Harris to make Chamberlain into a more empathetic figure than generally is allowed in the judgment of history. . . . In Munich, Harris meticulously recreates the tense atmosphere of the negotiations. . . . [A] compelling version of fictionalised history. . . . The behind-the-scenes intrigue propels [the] novel. . . . Harris is adept at weaving real and imaginary elements without letting the one unbalance the other.” —The Australian ROBERT HARRIS is the author of twelve novels: Fatherland, Enigma, Archangel, Pompeii, Imperium, The Ghost Writer, Conspirata, The Fear Index, An Officer and a Spy, Dictator, Conclave, and Munich. Several of his books have been adapted to film, most recently The Ghost. His work has been translated into thirty-seven languages. He lives in the village of Kintbury, England, with his wife, Gill Hornby. US

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