The Circumstantial Enemy by John R. Bell

Many kudos to John R. Bell for writing this wonderful historical fiction book loosely based on his father-in-law’s experiences during WWII. There is much to love about it and I especially enjoyed that the main character was from Croatia.  Most WWII novels I have read are set somewhere in Western Europe or Great Britain. We tend to forget about those countries that were eventually swallowed up by the USSR.

The main character, Vlatko Anton “Tony” Babic, is a one of the few pilots in the region with experience (though very limited) and he has great value to the Germans in the new Croatian Air Force Legion.  As his choices are presented, he finds he is left with no other option but to join and serve the Germans.

Tony’s friends, whom are staunchly against the Nazis, take the side of the partisans. Therefore, when he falls for the beautiful Katarina, which his friend Goran also is in love with, things become difficult. You see, Katarina owes the partisans a huge debt for saving her life and to repay that debt she must betray Tony.

The betrayal ends up costing Tony the lives of his crew. Of course, he has no way of knowing at time and it is something that will come back to haunt them in the end. In addition, he is wounded and sent to a prison-of-war camp in the United States. There he faces more challenges from the Nazis prisoners who wish to run the camp.

During his imprisonment, Tony and Katarina start corresponding and soon they each profess their love for the other. Yet, Tony still does not know about Katarina’s betrayal.  When the war ends and Tony finally makes his way home, and the truth comes out, they will have to forgive and forget to find happiness with each other.

The story was good and made better by the fact that there are basic truths underlying it. I am thankful that authors, like Mr. Bell, have taken the time to research and recount these stories before all of the veterans are dead and their stories are truly lost.

The plot moved along quickly as one challenge was resolved only to be replaced by another. In addition, there were enough twists to help with plot movement. Despite moving quickly, the plot was never rushed. As with war stories, monumental things happen to the characters and their struggles deeply affect them. If the story is told deftly, as here, they also affect the reader and build a connection with the characters. The only negative on the plot is, and it is very slight, I found the first part of the story a little slow. The author spent some time building the characters for the reader and sometimes that requires the pace to be sacrificed a little. Once I made it past the first thirty or so pages, I was hooked.

The author did an excellent job with the characters. Of course, I loved Tony, I felt he was such a rake (in his defense, he was young) at the beginning; however, as the story moved along you could see him mature. The other characters were a mix of both like and hate for me. Though I found Goran to be somewhat of an enigma. Despite this I felt sorry him and was somewhat surprised with his lot in the end. No spoilers here; therefore, you will have to read for yourself to find out what I mean.

In short, this is a well-researched and written WWII fictional story. I highly recommend to readers of historical fiction, WWII history and historical nonfiction.

Disclosure: While I used my KU account to download the ebook, the author did request a review.