A stand-alone set in 1930s Munich at the rise of Hitler and Nazi ideals, this book was a refreshing take on a thriller with more of a historical fiction feel. We follow Sebastian Wolff, a murder detective in the Munich Police, who after being imprisoned briefly in one of the camps, Dachau, and witnesses the brutality that occurs there, he is asked to investigate the murder of an English woman, with orders from Hitler to close the case as quickly as possible.

Despite anti-Semitic views and characters determined to sway the conclusions and suspects, including having to work with the very officer that sent him to Dachau, Wolff is determined to find out the truth, despite the case being solved. Willing to risk his relationship with his son, a member of the Hitler Youth, his job, and his life, Wolff refuses to rest until he has got to the very bottom of this case.

This book was incredibly well-researched, with the historical timeline fitting within the novel, Nazi movements and views at the very foundation of this text, allowing the reader a further insight into how life was during this period for Bavarians, Germans and Jewish members of society.

This story is dark and brutal, not shying away from experiences, attitudes and violence faced by a multitude of characters, not just our murder victims, giving its readers the full experience. A truly compelling read, with a plot and a detective with a moral code that made this book difficult to put down. The suspense built throughout this book, with high up officials determined to close the case that as a reader I was desperate to find out more about.

Fans of historical fiction, thrillers and world war history should definitely check this book out.

The Munich Wolf by Rory Clements
Having read all of the Tom Wilde series I was eager to read this standalone novel set in Munich in the 1930’s. As the novel opens Sebastian Wolff, who is a Munich police officer, is detained in Dachau for failing to give the Nazi salute to Hitler. Hitler has gained widespread adulation and there are many English such as Unity Mitford who are keen to fall at his feet. It is very embarrassing therefore when a young English woman with connections to the crown is brutally murdered. Wolff’s familial connections enable him to be released from Dachau but he is then given the poisoned chalice of investigating the English murder.
He is also assigned a second in command to work alongside him, Hans Winter, the very officer who was responsible for his stay in Dachau. There is huge pressure on him to solve the case and when Winter brings forward ‘evidence’ and witnesses to swear the murder was committed by a young Jewish man he is soon incarcerated awaiting his trial.
Wolff is not convinced by the evidence and looks into the young girls friends. It is obvious that there are powerful people who do not want the murderer brought to justice and when another murder is uncovered it is certain that Wolff is on the right track. There are attempts made on his life and we see him skilfully unravel the mystery at the heart of the novel.
The depiction of Munich and Nuremberg is very well done and the depth of the research is obvious throughout. I enjoyed the character of Sebastian Wolff and felt that there was the possibility for further outings for him and Hans Winter. I enjoyed the story and felt as if I had learnt a great deal about the turmoil in Germany and Hitler’s rise to power. I will be recommending the book to those in my book groups. Thanks to the author, the publishers and to Net Galley for the opportunity to read the book in return for an honest review.

I enjoyed this latest thriller from Rory Clements. This is a standalone novel following on from his Professor Tom Wilde series that I loved.
This book is set in 1930s Germany, mostly in Munich, and it follows Sebastian Wolff a Detective in the Munich police force. He’s assigned to a very high profile murder case that has additional interest from Adolf Hitler himself. He’s under enormous pressure from his boss and the Nazi Party to find the murderer quickly and without any fuss. Wolff however wants to do his job properly, by methodically looking at all the angles and interviewing all the appropriate people who can help him solve the case.
I could feel the menace of the Nazi machinations throughout the book, even though this was before it was at the height of its powers.
I liked Wolff he was a good man, who really hated the Nazis and didn’t dance to their tune at all. He had to be careful as he investigated, especially when talking to friends of the top Nazis, like Unity Mitford, who was just as vile in this book as she was in real life!
I must admit that I was a little disappointed that this was very similar to the Tom Wilde series, except it was set in Germany instead of England, as I was expecting something slightly different. It was a good thriller full of red herrings that I fell for, and didn’t guess the murderer at all!
Recommended for lovers of historical crime fiction.

Sebastian Wolff of the Kripo, the criminal police in Munich 1935 is tasked with solving the murder of a young English girl - one of the group of young 'finishing school' types who flocked to Munich is the 1930's to socialise, learn German, the German way of life and traditions and especialy the Nazi regime. The book is an education in itself (wihtout being pedantic - it's a super-flowing read). This group included Unity Mitford, of the famous Mitford sisters - Unity 'adoring' Hitler.
Wolff is assigned an abhorrent member of the Bavarian Political Police (linked to SS) and one who was responsible for a short stay of his, in Dachau. Luckily he has super-powerful family connections, namely 'The Pig', his Uncle Christian, who he does not admire but does find useful. As well as a wonderful 'whodunnit' the story shows the dilemma of ordinary law-abiding citizens of Germany at a time when conforming to Hitler's rules was enforced.
Hitler himself has assigned the case to Wolff and he is under pressure to perform and deliver the perpetrator within days - Hitler wants to appease his English friends as a treaty is due to be signed. Wolff is thrown in the deep end but is determined to bring about justice - but will he be permitted to do so?
This was a super read - historic mystery, partly political, suspenseful, and I learned things I never knew - leading me to a podcast about Germany between the wars. Absolutely fascinating as well as an exciting crime mystery. Highly recommended.

Munich, 1935. The place to be for the vibrant young, especially young English ladies who have a strong appetite for the young soldiers in the dashing Nazi uniforms. That is until a high-born English girl is found murdered.
Detective Sebastian Wolff of the Kripo has been given the case and it must be solved quickly, as The Fuhrer himself has taken an interest.
Wolff who is not a party member and is up against it. He is followed by the secret police, threatened by his son, an avid Hitler youth activist. The stakes couldn’t be higher. Things go from bad to worse when he realises that the killer could be apart of the highest echelons of the party.
Can he solve this complex case in time and stay alive in the process?
Rory Clements has written another superb novel in Munich Wolff. He sets the book up beautifully. It has a tense atmosphere and incredible paranoia throughout the book, along with a main character that won’t back down.
I found the book utterly compelling. Nobody writes this kind of fiction better in my opinion. A truly wonderful story and one I highly recommend.

I am a huge fan of Rory Clements and this book lived up to his great standards. It's a standalone murder mystery set in Nazi era Germany where Sebastian Wolff investigates the murder of a young English woman. It's dark and starts off slowly but becomes gripping and twisty. I hope that Sebastian Wolff will appear again in a future novel.

Ok... where do I start. For some unfathomable reason I've never read anything by Rory Clements before. But this is definitely not going to be my last.

This is so totally my kind of book. Historical novels, particularly ones set in/around World War 2, especially in "The Third Reich" are my absolute favourite books. And Munich Wolf did not disappoint.

Rory really captured how I have always thought it would have been to live in those tumultuous times. Sebastian Wolff may have been a police inspector, but even that didn't mean he was safe from Nazi persecution. In fact the local police force had next to no power when compared to the Gestapo and SS officers.

Tasked with investigating the murder of a young British woman, Sebastian is up against the clock as he knows the accused man isn't guilty of anything more than being Jewish. But it's clear that Munich's elite want him framed anyway.

I can't imagine how hard it must have been to seek justice in such an injust world. Rory really knows how to weave a good story, whilst maintaining historical accuracy.

I’m a huge fan of Rory Clements’ novels. I loved his John Shakespeare historical crime series set in Elizabethan England comprising Martyr, Revenger, Prince, Traitor, The Heretics, The Queen’s Man and Holy Spy. And I absolutely adore his Tom Wilde series set in WW2 Cambridge comprising (so far) Corpus, Nucleus, Nemesis, Hitler’s Secret, A Prince and a Spy, The Man in the Bunker and The English Führer.

So I came to Munich Wolf with high expectations; I wasn’t disappointed. Sebastian Wolff is, if you like, Tom Wilde’s German alter ego. Like Wilde, he has a strong sense of justice. And in the same way Wilde has his trusty Rudge Special motorcycle, Wolff has his beloved Lancia Augusta cabriolet. But in their personal lives they differ. Wolff’s barely disguised loathing for Hitler’s regime has created a breach in his relationship with his son Jurgen, who is a fervent admirer of the Führer and a member of the Hitler Youth. It’s only when an act of violence comes close to home for Jurgen that their frosty relationship thaws a little.

The book sees Wolff’s commitment to uncovering the truth come slap bang up against political interests, both domestic and international. There’s a quite complex structure of different security and police institutions, but stick with it. Given the period in which it’s set and what we now know about the dreadful acts perpetrated by the Nazi regime, it’s probably no surprise that the story goes to some dark, sinister and perverted places, places populated by fanatics. ‘Paganism, ritual murder, sex magic, the Thule Society [a German occultist and Völkisch group founded in Munich shortly after World War I], Hitler’s obsession with the occult, the runic symbol for the sun, the geblōt places of ancient Nordic sacrifices…’

In pursuing his investigation, Wolff faces personal risks but he doggedly persists resulting in confrontations with some particularly ruthless individuals and a spell in a concentration camp. He’s also hampered in his enquiries by being assigned an assistant, Sergeant Hans Winter, with whom Wolff had already had an inauspicious first meeting, and who in reality is his minder, informing his bosses in the Bavarian Political Police (the forerunner of the Gestapo) about Wolff’s movements. Things really hot up when Wolff gets a little too close to implicating some influential figures in the regime.

Real life figures abound, in particular English socialite Unity Mitford who as well as coming across as an utter snob, shows herself to be an antisemite and vile apologist for the Nazi regime.

Sebastian Wolff is a great character. He’s a man of action but the author has also given him an interesting personal hinterland. (He’s rather swoonworthy as well.) Although badged as a standalone novel, I can see Munich Wolf being the first book in a series – in fact, I’d be overjoyed if it is.

Action-packed, full of twists and turns, and with fascinating historical detail, Munich Wolf is another powerful thriller from the pen of Rory Clements, ideal for fans of the late lamented Philip Kerr’s Bernie Gunther series,

Fantastic read again from Rory Clements. Set in pre-war Nazi Germany he's created a tense, engrossing plot and two excellent characters in Wolff and Winter.
Perfect for his growing army of readers and anyone who enjoys a hardboiled crime thriller.

I’ve read and enjoyed Rory Clements’ recent Tom Wilde books set around the time of the Second World War. Here, we have a new protagonist in Munich Kripo detective Sebastian Wolff. For the Anglo-American Wilde, it’s straightforward to work against the German enemy during the war. For Wolff in 1935 it’s more complicated: he hopes the regime will collapse but in the meantime he has to try to do his job while being watched over not only by his police superiors but also the altogether darker forces of the political police, known in other parts of Germany as the Gestapo. All while dealing with the disdain of his Hitler Youth enthusiast teenage son whose mother upped and left him holding the baby.
It was good timing for me to read this now as I’ve just listened to a series of The Rest is History episodes about the Nazis’ rise to power. The story here is woven around real events and people, including such famous faces as Putzi Hanfstaengl and Unity Mitford; Hitler has a cameo. Even in fiction their bigotry is nauseating. Dachau, horridly close to Munich, was already operational that early. Munich Wolf is well-paced and has good action scenes; there are plenty of possible culprits so that the outcome isn’t obvious.

Rory Clements can do no wrong! I wasn’t sure if Tom Wilde could better John Shakespeare and he did and already Sebastian Wolff is a three dimensional, interesting and likeable new main character enduring all the bureaucracy and bullying of life in Nazi Germany in what I hope will be yet another excellent new series from this author.

Clements’s writing is always gripping, pacy and full of twists and turns but it also benefits from accurate research which builds a clear picture for the reader of the social context and political situation that the characters are experiencing. The horror, terror and brutality of Nazi rule aren’t shied away from but there is also warmth and humanity in unexpected places.
His heroes are always personable , courageous and intelligent and are definitely the kind of people you would like to have around in a crisis. The reader gets to enjoy full insights into the life of Wolff and I felt empathy with him from the first few pages. A truly talented and inspiring author.
I would thoroughly recommend this book and I hope we will get to read more about Wolff in the future.

This is my first venture into a Rory Clement novel, after reading the blurb for Munich Wolf I was intrigued about this crime thriller.
Munich Wolf is set in the time between both world wars and the setting was interesting to read and imagine.
I really enjoyed this novel, it was written with great description, the characters were all created with a rich and realistic creativeness to them. The storyline just gripped me and the murder mystery had me hooked. I was so eager to find out the outcome.
Munich Wolf is advertised as a standalone but it certainly sets it up to become a series.

An excellent murder and survival thriller set in Munich while Bavaria was still the centre of NAZI power.

The author has set several novels before, during and after WW2 and this is one of his best so far.
Partly because the hero is trying to avoid heroism at all costs.
A criminal detective and a political policeman find themselves in conflict with each other even before either knows who the other is, then they are required to work with each other whilst being alert to every opportunity to destroy each other. (This really is the way NAZI Germany worked, right up to the top. Even within Hitler’s inner circle, his preferred method was to make his associates fight each other until a clear winner emerged. This selects the plan with the strongest advocate rather than the strongest plan and the chances of success dwindle with each reiteration of the challenge process.)

Neither Inspector Sebastian Wolff nor Sergeant Hans Winter have any intention of challenging the regime as such: they are both really only trying to survive but it takes a while for them to perceive each other correctly. Constant manipulation of their actions and the general situation by those so disproportionately more powerful than their actual superiors creates a storm that they can only survive by helping each other -and in a fascist State that’s actually more subversive than blowing up railway lines.

What makes this well-researched and well-written novel most interesting is quite nuanced, in that Hitler isn’t shown as holding power by being the most extreme candidate (at least, not in 1935 when the story is set); there are others in or close to the party MUCH further round the bend, but all in one particular direction or another. This story revolves around the Thule Society, but there were other factions and sects within the Party. Even in an “extreme right” party there are left and right wings and in terms of economic policy the National Socialists were actually the hard left. In such a situation, powerful individuals oppose the rival they fear the most. The left-leaning ones fear what the right-leaning ones might do and the right-leaning ones fear what the left-leanings might do. So they agree on someone who’s not clearly right or left. The problem is that the centre-standing candidate might do almost anything and he often does. Both Stalin and Hitler came to lead their respective parties through the same mechanism.

The neo-pagan murderer in this story turns out to be so deranged that the “highest authority” in Germany comes to regret trying to cover for him. This raises the unsettling idea that the Third Reich contained and could even have been led by such a person rather than Hitler. There was potential for evil beyond even the Holocaust.

It is 1935 and in Munich it is not wise or safe to speak out again Hitler or his followers. When an English girl is murdered Detective Sebastián Wolff is placed under immense pressure to find the killer regardless of the lack of evidence. A young Jew is named as killer but is he innocent and will there be more victims?

This is a gripping, well written novel. Wolff wants to find the truth but he is forced to follow the party line. This will put him and those he cares about in grave danger. The situation is complicated more by Wolff’s son who truly believes in the new regime. Enjoy.

Detective Sebastian Wolff is ordered to solve the murder of a high born English girl in 1935 Munich. The girl is among many young socialites, including Unity Mitford, who have come across from England to learn German and be part of the glamour surrounding the Nazi party in the years preceding the war. Wolff is not a member of the Nazi Party (although his uncle is a high ranking member who both pushes and protects him) and is not happy with the political situation of his country. His partner for investigating the crime, however, is a paid up and passionate supporter of the regime and Wolff has to handle the political and personal implications for himself as he tries to uncover the truth.

Rory Clements is best known as the author of a series of spy thrillers about Thomas Wilde, a Cambridge Professor. This book is not linked to that series but is set in the same time period and it's an era the author obviously knows extremely well. The atmosphere Wolff is living in is suffocating - it gives a real sense of how much the country has been overtaken by the ideology, how many are true believers, but also how difficult it is to oppose. There is an undercurrent of menace and danger throughout, nobody can be trusted, it's impossible to speak openly and a wrong move can be disastrous. The injustice and danger are impossible to avoid and the frustration and fear of Wolff are palpable.

The plot of the book is involving and the characters all good but it was the atmosphere the author built that really had me gripped. I will absolutely be seeking out the Wilde books to read - I also hope Sebastian Wolff comes along again as I'm interested to see what happens to these characters next!

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for an advance copy in return for an honest review.
#MunichWolf #NetGalley

Seb Wolf is a Inspector with the German police in 1930s Munich, he is not a Nazi sympathiser and refuses to join the party.

In the opening chapter we find Wolf in Dachau for not saluting Hitler, it makes for uncomfortable reading. He is only released due to his uncle being high up in the Nazi Party and the fact he is needed, possibly to be a scapegoat, to investigate the murder of an English aristocrat.

As always brilliantly researched by Rory Clemens, and whilst I have enjoyed his previous Tom Wilde books, I found this one harder to enjoy.

Definitely worth a read

My thanks to the Author publisher's and NetGalley for providing me with a Kindle version of this book to read and honestly review.

BRILLIANT.

BRILLIANT research and writing.
BRILLIANT characters throughout totally believable a clever mix of real and fictional.
BRILLIANT surprises and twists plenty of mystery and tension.
BRILLIANT atmospheric a real feel for time and place.
BRILLIANT unputdownable page turner.
BRILLIANT I can think of no higher praise than to rate this book alongside the late great Philip Kerr's 'Bernie Gunther' series.

The only bad thing about this terrific story is that according to the blurb this is a standalone story.
No Seb Wolff and the other excellent characters must ride again, and soon PLEASE.

I was delighted to be given the opportunity to review the Munich Wolf because I have enjoyed reading Rory Clements books. Not only does he write about the period I am interested in, that is the Second World War, but he researches his subject so well that you can imagine yourself being in the same place. The story takes place in Munich and Inspector Seb Wolf is “volunteered” to take charge of the brutal murder of a young English girl who is one of the bright young things that went to Germany in the 1930s to study German and their culture. Hitler is rising rapidly in power and the murder has political and international concerns which causes the Inspector many problems. He and his Sergeant investigate the murder and others that follow. I really enjoyed reading Munich Wolf that I had to finish it and discover the perpetrators of this heinous crime. I strongly recommend this book to you and think you will enjoy it as much as I did. Looking forward to reading Rory Clements next book.

Thank you so much for this ARC. I have read a lot of Rory Clements books about Germany and the regime. It’s such a fascinating subject to learn about and his books are well researched. This book is a standalone novel featuring the character of Sebastian Wolf who is in the police force in Munich, asked to solve the murder of a British girl. As the case develops he is up against certain eventualities. This is an excellent read - has to be my favourite yet!

I hope we get more stories with Sebastian Wolf!

The latest Clement book is set in 1935 Nazi Germany with Inspector Sebastian Wolff a member of the criminal police tasked with solving the murder of a young English girl in Munich. Wolff has to tread a fine line of solving the murder and keeping senior Nazis happy. Not enamoured of the Nazis himself and having to deal with his son's commitment to the cause and the Hitler Youth he is walking a precarious fine line where a single error could send him to Dachau.
This is an exciting well plotted novel with believable characters and an air of permanent menace.