I’ve been a fan of alternate history novels for many years. There are a lot of bad ones out there, many of them featuring space aliens (those I’m not such a fan of) or completely implausible plots that are so far-fetched that history dorks like myself have a hard time swallowing their basic premise long enough to get in to the story.

There are three basic types of alternate history novels. The first consists of books that take their point of departure at a real point in history, introduces some science fiction-y twist, and goes from there. I don’t tend to read these — I like science fiction, but I don’t quite buy into the concept of space aliens fighting for (or against) the Nazis for some reason or another.

The next category of alternate history novels take their point of departure from a real point in history. They’re usually set in the aftermath, so that the details of the change from the actual timeline are revealed slowly, over the course of the book.

The first alternate history novel I ever read, Nevil Shute’s On the Beach falls into this category. On the Beach tends to get classified as an antiwar novel, which it certainly is, although I rather think that its depiction of post-World War III Australia qualifies it as an alternate history book. Over the course of the novel, which begins long enough after the war that the shock has worn off, we get to know a group of characters las the last few habitable spots on the planet succumb to increased radiation levels and they all die. It’s grim stuff.

One of my favorite books also falls into this category: Fatherland, by Robert Harris. Fatherland is set in Berlin in 1964, a generation after Germany’s military triumph over Europe in the second world war. It’s a classic of the genre, as familiar historical terms — Holocaust, Cold War, European Community — have been given new meanings that are slowly revealed over the course of the book. The book focuses on the unlikely alliance between an American reporter and a criminal investigator in the SS as they investigate the murders of the attendees of the Wannsee Conference, at which the details of the Final Solution were worked out. Unlike some of the other novels that depict a German victory in the European theater, Harris’ Nazi empire is creaking under the weight of its success. The war generation is weary of decades under fascist rule. The younger generation takes the spoils of victory for granted making generally unenthusiastic consipirators in the drive to keep the Reich afloat. Add to this the sudden development of a breakthrough in peace talks with the Americans, and the race to the finish line is heart-pounding.

The third category are novels that take a moment in history, create a series of events that didn’t happen around it, and then resumes the historical timeline. They present a subtle “what if?” — and Hitler’s Peace is one of these.

Willard Mayer is a professor of philosophy at Princeton who is recruited by the FDR administration to prepare a report on the authenticity of a leaked file detailing the massacre of Polish army officers at Katyn Forest prior to the meeting of the Big Three at Tehran in 1943. At the same time, Himmler is sending out feelers to see whether the Allies would be willing to negotiate a diplomatic solution to the war. There are many in the American camp who are uneasy about the alliance with the Soviet Union, feeling that Stalin is capable of far worse than Hitler, and want to consider the German offer. Many of them question whether America is making a big mistake by turning a blind eye toward Stalin’s purges and human rights violations. It’s a stirring alternative to most of the American collective memory about the war, which recalls a fully unified front of ‘patriots.’

There’s also plot afoot within the Gestapo to assassinate the Big Three at Tehran, a beautiful Polish seductress in Cairo, a grumpy Winston Churchill (go fig), and a surprise guest at Tehran that took me completely by surprise (hint: it’s not the shah, who is relegated to the background in the book just like he was in real life).

By the end of the book, the course of history has returned to the one we’re familiar with — it’s the points in between that are the intriguing part of this book, and it’s an interesting ride. Phillip Kerr is a meticulous writer who knows his subject, and it’s a great ride over the course of the tale. We get to meet most of the major players in the war, and we get a sense of them as people — even Hitler himself. Ironically, the least likable character is that of Willard Mayer, who’s a little too complicated for his own good. The end of the tale — which isn’t a surprise, since it builds up over the last half of the book — seems rather contrived and rushed, as if Kerr recognized that he had to make a strategic choice as to whether to radically alter the course of history and couldn’t figure out how to avoid it in a slightly more graceful manner.

There’s an interesting endnote in which we find out that a lot of the book’s plot twists are real — and offers up a more detailed examination of the still unanswered historical questions that form the framework of the plot. It’s interesting stuff.

I’ll give this one a 7 out of 10.