Paving the New Road

November 27, 2017
In Gentill’s less-than-successful fourth mystery featuring Australian artist Rowland Sinclair (after 2017’s Miles Off Course), Charles Hardy, a real-life Australian senator, asks for Rowland’s help in thwarting the rise of the New Guard, a group that intends to bring European fascism to their country, even though Hardy has always suspected Rowland of being a Communist spy. The New Guard is led by Col. Eric Campbell, another historical figure, who’s visiting Germany in 1933. Hardy wants Rowland, who speaks German, to look into Campbell’s connections to the Nazi regime and the mysterious death of the cattle rancher he sent to shadow Campbell. Rowland agrees to go as long as his motley group of allies—“a Communist painter, a Jewish poet, and an unpredictable sculptress”—can accompany him to Germany. Once Sinclair and company arrive in Germany, his exploits, which include disguising himself as one of Hitler’s guards, strain credulity. Gentill does a good job capturing the period, but her attempts to apply a light touch to the Nazis will strike some readers as misguided.