This is a story that needs to be told. The Lebensborn program, where the Nazis literally bred people with superior Aryan characteristics in order to create a master race, is not something that you hear a lot about. At least, not in fiction, and certainly not in fiction presented to teens. So when I heard about this book, a book narrated by a Lebensborn beginning at his birth, I thought, Finally. This will be a striking, important book! What would it be like to be raised, from birth, on a diet of Nazi propaganda? And not just that Germans are a master race, but that you, specifically, have been born a superior being? The Lebensborn did not know their fathers. They were taken from their mothers and adopted out to high-ranking Nazi officers as a reward. I have never come across a story about what happened to any of them, and my degree is basically in German literature, I am married to a man with a degree in German, and we met when we were both in a bizarre post-WWII German play. Needless to say, as soon as I heard about it, I had to read this book. And now I am angry. Not that such a thing happened, not the sort of anger that reading about WWII, or the Holocaust, causes. Not that righteous anger. No, I'm angry because the first book I've ever found about the Lebensborn program is a FREAKING HOT MESS and I want to know how anyone thought this would be okay.I suspect part of the problem is that it is translated from French. A lot of my issues stem from what I shall call word choice in this book. Let's give the benefit of the doubt to Ms. Cohen-Scali and say that she had a very clumsy translator. Much of the slang and several of the idioms are jarringly modern, pulling me out of the story repeatedly to frown and think, would they have known what that was in 1936? In war-torn 1941 Berlin? Annnnd then there's the swearing. So many swears! Now, bear with me. I'm no shrinking flower when it comes to swearing in literature (just ask my easily shocked book club.) And yes, I know that the F-word was not unknown in the 1940's. I'd just like to know how a four-year-old, raised in an environment where pure thoughts were held to such a high standard, would hear that word enough to use it constantly. Also, calling all women bitches. Let's think about this. He knows, even before he is born, that he is special. His mother is one of the finest examples of Aryan womanhood. All the women there are. They have been carefully examined and vetted, their pedigrees checked and rechecked, they are revered as goddesses doing their sacred duty. And running the Lebensborn home are a bevy of nunlike women, all of whom nearly faint at the sound of Hitler's voice on the radio. They speak constantly of higher thoughts, of taking care of beautiful Aryan bodies for the purity of the homeland, nobility of purpose for men and women, etc. etc. How then is this child then born thinking (and later speaking) not only a constant stream of venomous f-words, but also referring to all women as bitches and whores? Where did he learn this? Not one other person in the book is depicted as talking this way, so who is he modeling his speech after?And that's really where I have a huge problem with this book. Not the swearing, not the fact that the main character is a little jerk (which I expected), but the fact that he is so inconsistent. Inconsistent to the time period, to his upbringing, and inconsistent with his own past behavior. He will say that he forgets his real mother, or this person, or that event. Then later he will describe the person 0r the event in detail for someone, with no explanation of whether he was lying about forgetting, or something made the memory return. He has seen soldiers having sex with both prostitutes and prisoners at one house where he lives, and talks about how boring it is and how uninterested he is in girls' bodies, then a chapter later he naughtily sneaks off to spy on some naked girls. (He is also way too young at this time to know or care about what he is seeing.) (And actually that's the point where I nearly had to DNF this book. I don't know about you, but reading page after page of excruciating details about young girls being kidnaped, beaten, and then given a highly invasive gynecological exam is about my limit for gratuitous anything in a book. Ditto the descriptions of young boys' penises which seemed entirely exploitative.)There is a large chunk of the book where he is four years old, which made me wonder if the author had ever met a four year old. Not only does he speak and think in long, eloquent sentences, but his physical behavior is well above and beyond even an eight-year-old. He's supposed to be smart and physically "perfect" but not preternaturally smart and strong. At this time he also knows exactly what happens at concentration camps, and works for a time with a collaborator. She defies her handlers, and he is confused when he doesn't see her again and thinks perhaps she has been sent back to the camp. Years later he thinks about exactly how she was executed, as though he knew. Also, having talked since the day he was born about inferior people being killed, having spent years at a special school training to be a good Nazi, and having learned that he is using soap made from the fat of murdered Jews, when someone tells him that the Jews in concentration camps are being killed, he freaks out like he's never heard such a horrible thing. Okay, seriously?There's no moment of clarity where he discovers that all he knows is wrong, nor is there a moment when he decides that, no matter the evidence, the Nazi way is always right. There's no consistency to what he does and doesn't know, or how he will react. He seems to have few emotions at all, unless being arrogant counts as an emotion. Even when no praise is given, he believes himself to be superior, and it's all he thinks about. Yet he never seems to come "down" because of his hubris. The book is just a recitation of what happened in the war, as told by an arrogant little brat who keeps contradicting himself. For contrast, the one person he actually likes and looks up to is a fine Aryan specimen who is secretly Jewish. He is based on the very real Solomon Perel, a young Jewish man who attended an elite Nazi school as the ultimate cover story. (His story is told in "Europa, Europa," which is both a book and a superb movie.) This story would have been equally interesting, except he is also a jerk who does things with no rhyme or reason, therefore he is impossible to understand or root for. Can you see why I'm angry? The premise of this book is gold. Her research seems to have been impeccable. There's a bibliography and notes at the end. It has all the earmarks of an important book for the WWII fiction shelves. And then she drops the ball so hard it's painful to read.