As he does in The Winds of War, Wouk presents his story from a variety of narrative perspectives, attempting to explain the rationale for the war, and even the rationale for the Holocaust.

Adopting such a technique allows him to offer a view of the war from the Germans' perspective, and to introduce real-life figures to speculate on their motives for acting as they did to influence the course of the conflict. The interaction of fictional characters with men such as Franklin Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, and even Adolf Hitler, allows Wouk to portray the mind-set of these important historical figures. By ascribing to the more flexible traditions of the romance, Wouk is able to have his fictional personages interact freely with these great men; at times, his hero is made responsible for actions which determine the course of the war.

Balancing the professional memoirs of the fictional German...