The Zookeeper's War

The Zookeeper's War by Steven Conte
My rating: 1 of 5 stars

I was tempted to read this book by its title. There was obvious connection with The Zookeeper's Wife, which I rated quite high. Actually I preferred the movie over the book.
It looks, that reading the book about Warsaw Zoo and knowledge of some facts about its connection with Berlin Zoo completely disqualified Zookeeper's War.

Main character of Zookeeper's War is Alex Frey, a director of Berlin ZOO. He looks with sentiment at the portrait of his Father, who preceded him in this position.
So far, so good, I looked into Wikipedia to check what I remember from Zookeeper's Wife - director of Berlin ZOO during the war was Luck Heck. Yes, his father preceded him in this position.
And then... Mr Heck joined Nazi Party in 1937, but even before this he was enthusiast of National Socialism. He was personal friend of Herman Goring crazy about idea of reconstructing some mythical old German animal species.
As a Director of Berlin Zoo, in 1938, he passed a rule which prohibited Jews from visiting the zoo. On occasion of Hitler's birthday he was appointed a Professor.
During the war he was instrumental in pillaging the Warsaw Zoo, this is a role in which we can see him in Zookeeper's Wife.
More about Heck Luck achievements here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lutz_Heck

I was quite surprised that an Australian author choose as a topic of his book such exotic theme as Berlin Zoo during the II World War. But I cannot comprehend why he did not bother to check the most essential facts.

No wonder I read the book with some dismay and great suspicion.
Well, I got some negative satisfaction - the book is not only based on totally false foundations, it is also terribly boring. Pages and pages of descriptions of city landscapes after carpet bombing.
It looks to me that the only reason for writing this book was to show some intramarital issues, I have to admit there is some sense in it.
I was interested in final chapters - encounter with Red Army.
Disappointment again, generally not convincing and the final episode involving the main character I found simply disgusting.

P.S. The book was awarded a Prime Minister award in 2008.
2008, then Kevin Rudd was our Prime Minister. He was the only one of Australian Prime Ministers known to me, whom I could suspect for reading books. But it looks he accepted carelessly an award for a very dubious project.

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