June 1944 ­– When a Wehrmacht war crimes investigator and his escort are killed in an ambush it looks like an opportunistic act of resistance by the Armia Krajowa, which will provoke the usual bloody reaction from the occupiers. But Jan Kalisz of the Warsaw Kripo has his doubts, especially when it’s announced that he and his comrades could be among the executioners., Fortunately, with the Red Army a few hundred kilometres away on the Berezina and his faith in the Fuhrer waning, Kalisz’s boss, Hauptsturmführer Hoth is in the mood to indulge his Polish detective. The hunt for the real killers takes Kalisz first to a battered Berlin and then within reach of the Russian guns, but the answer lies with a key witness who’s now in a concentration camp. At Auschwitz-Birkenau Kalisz is reacquainted with his former partner, Doctor Josef Mengele, with near fatal results. By the time Kalisz escapes Mengele’s clutches and returns to Warsaw, the city is a powder keg on the brink of exploding. After five years of reluctant collaboration is it finally time for Jan Kalisz to show his true allegiance?

Published on 9 July, 2026