Heil Safari
1. When Diedrich Heil is sent to an adventure camp for troubled teens, he's hoping to hike to the nearest town and spend the summer busking. The problem: the camp is in the middle of Africa, 200 miles from civilization, and his singing tends to attract hostile wildlife.
2. Being a German prisoner in an American POW camp in WWII is bad enough, but when you also suffer from wire enclosure fever, can your fellow POWs trust you to build a tunnel under the barbed wire and lead them to freedom across the Mexican border?
3. Hijinks ensue when a group of Hitler Youth are sent to Africa to "toughen up" for a possible war. What with rampaging rhinos, bloodthirsty lions and territorial baboons, most of the 13-year-old kids won't survive to see combat. But it's all sooo much fun, who cares?
4. Is Hitler alive and well in Argentina? Most people would say NO, but Sheldon Davis, grandson of Holocaust survivors and Moche culture specialist, is pretty sure he knows where Der Fuhrer is hiding. All he needs is a GoFundMe, some new phones to trade with the locals, a couple of mercenaries, and he'll be in business. If only he wasn't 12 years old.
5. Join Viktor on a guilt trip through polluted deserts, deforested jungles, a museum of endangered and extinct species, and a general wail about human ineptitude. Then, send him money.
6. A documentary journal of a legion of Nazis sent to hunt rare animals. By the end, they all die (the Nazis that is).
7. A big game hunt gone wrong on the planet Heil VI leads to a missing heiress, a miraculous vaccine, and a spy working for so many sides he doesn't care anymore. Thankfully, Monty is on hand to tame the devils of Hell, er Heil, laser pistol-bullwhip style. Also, genetic manipulation gone horribly wrong.
8. Did you know there are dangerous things like boar, stags, and wolves in Germany? Colin didn't either, and that's why he's now struggling to stay alive after his school's German club trip goes disastrously wrong. Also, an ancient Nazi hermit.
9. 1887. Helmut Schmeir, archaeologist and hunter, leads a dedicated group of scientists across German East Africa in search of the elusive Ogopogo, a living apatosaurus. With a love triangle between Schmeir, lovely Ingrid Braun, and Dr. Ludwig Meyer.
Original Version
German officer Captain Martin Beyer is desperate to escape from an American prisoner of war camp. To get out, he and other prisoners are digging a tunnel under the barbed wire fence. Beyer's concern for its success is not only that the Americans might find it, but can it be finished by the engineer in charge, a mentally unstable officer on the verge of suicide from wire enclosure fever. [On the bright side, the barbed wire is above ground and the tunnel is underground.]
Beyer is worried that his close friend, the engineer, may not complete the project of digging out for another reason. The engineer is in opposition to the fanatical Nazis who rule the camp inside, the Nazis regarding him as unpatriotic. They want him dead. They don't care if it jeopardizes the escape. [We don't mind escaping from this prison, but we refuse to escape through a tunnel built by someone we feel is insufficiently patriotic.] But Beyer can't allow failure. Being too long cooped in the enclosure, he's becoming unhinged.
He must get out or die.
Through sheer determination and effort, and just as the Americans are about to discover the tunnel, Beyer manages the escape. [Typical officer, takes all the credit after doing none of the work.] On the outside they are met by Heidi Zimmermann, a German-American female relative of one of the escapees. She provides the initial transportation to the Mexican border. In pursuit to recapture the prisoners before they get there are camp guards and FBI agents. [Imagine, there was a time when the US tried to prevent people from crossing the border into Mexico.] Beyer has trouble eluding them, but he will not give up. He would rather be killed than go back. ["The spectacular views of the mountains are nice, but they keep feeding us those damn Rocky Mountain oysters."] [How many escapees are there? Does Heidi have a bus? It wouldn't be hard to recapture escapees if they were on a 700-mile bus trip.]
It remains little known that during World War II there were over 360,000 German POWs interned in the United States. [450,000 according to Wikipedia.] My story is based on the true event that at Camp Trinidad, Colorado, prisoners escaped through a tunnel. [Camp Trinidad opened in 1943, and while I would become unhinged after two weeks in a POW camp, it seems like a professional soldier ought to be able to handle it for a few years.]
HEIL SAFARI is a 90,000 word thriller novel that is told from three points of view: the German prisoners, the American guards, and the FBI agents. I've had articles and short stories published in magazines, and I have a bachelor's degree in philosophy from a state university. Thank you for your time ans [and] consideration. Below I've included the first 10 pages.
Notes
As these POW camps in the US remain little-known, it might be better to mention them up front. Otherwise the mention of the Mexican border may give readers who thought the setting was somewhere in Europe the impression this is alternate history in which WWII was fought on US soil.
Notes
As these POW camps in the US remain little-known, it might be better to mention them up front. Otherwise the mention of the Mexican border may give readers who thought the setting was somewhere in Europe the impression this is alternate history in which WWII was fought on US soil.
3 comments:
The German POWs in Arizona recalled from maps that they were near the Salt River. They figured they'd escape and take a boat downriver. It wasn't until they were driven over it on the way to a work place that they discovered it was little more than a trickle. Perhaps your POWs are also surprised by the geography of the US?
To make this work, you'll need to focus on one German. He'd better be sympathetic as hell, because otherwise no one will read this. Forced to be a Nazi, wife and kid back home, Jewish best friend, disillusioned about the War, the whole nine yards. Otherwise this has less chance than, well, you get the idea.
Karen, that's true. The whole story is focused on making the German soldier seem sympathetic to the reader. There is also a strong emotional connection between the soldier and the girl who is rejected by her cold, abusive father. By juxtaposing the unloving father with the kind soldier we see the soldier in a different light. That's why it works.
This ms. is an action story. We are supposed to be rooting for, and therefore connecting with, these characters from the very beginning.
I can see this working with a character that is chasing the Nazis who, at first, only wants to recapture them, but maybe later realizes they aren't what he thought they were. That would give the reader someone to connect with.
This doesn't seem to be that story, though.
I honestly don't know who your audience is.
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