A cast of spies, zealots, and innocents is thrust into the moral crosshairs of Nazi Berlin, where survival demands quick wits and carefully hidden loyalties. In this world of uniforms and secrets, a boy’s choices reverberate far beyond the schoolyard, shaping missions that could alter the war. Friendships double as cover stories, and every act of courage risks betrayal.
Main Characters
Michael O'Shaunessey
Michael is a 13-year-old Irish diplomat’s son embedded in the Hitler Youth, narrating the story from the razor’s edge between childhood and espionage. Gifted with an eidetic memory but hampered by a fear of heights, he gathers intelligence while wrestling with guilt from Kristallnacht and the mounting costs of his choices. Guided and pressured in different ways by his parents, Megan and Davin O’Shaunessey, and driven by his evolving friendship with Fritz Brendler, he learns that information alone won’t win a war—action will. As he rescues a British pilot, infiltrates the SRD, and faces Fritz in a deadly endgame, his coming-of-age is defined by moral compromise and hard-won clarity about what—and whom—he’s willing to risk.
Fritz Brendler
Fritz begins as a small, bullied classmate whose father’s work on Projekt 1065 makes him valuable—and vulnerable—to exploitation. Longing to shed his weakness, he embraces Nazi ideology with fervor, rising into the elite SRD and seeking approval from ruthless authority while mistaking cruelty for strength. His early dependence on Michael curdles into rivalry and finally tragic enmity, as zeal eclipses friendship. Fritz’s descent, warped by the corrupting influence of Nazi ideology, turns him from victim to fanatic, crystallizing the novel’s meditation on friendship and betrayal.
Supporting Characters
Lieutenant Simon Cohen
Simon is a downed RAF pilot—a Jewish spy whose wit, nerve, and decency make him both mentor and brother figure to Michael. Teaching him Kim’s Game and the ethos of their fight, he reframes resistance as not only opposing evil but affirming what is worth dying for. His final act of self-sacrifice steadies Michael’s moral compass and underscores the story’s tragic calculus of wartime necessity.
Megan O'Shaunessey (Ma)
Megan is the strategist of the family’s spy ring, cool-headed and relentlessly pragmatic about the risks their mission demands. She pushes Michael into operations others would spare him from, convinced his skills can turn the tide. Her calculated choices reveal the cold discipline of deception and espionage continually at odds with a mother’s protective instinct.
Davin O'Shaunessey (Da)
Davin serves as the family’s diplomatic cover, channeling intelligence while striving to shield his son from their clandestine work. Cautious and protective, he often clashes with Megan over how far to push Michael. As the danger escalates, his resolve shifts toward extracting the family from Berlin, a choice that measures love against duty.
SS-Obersturmführer Trumbauer
Trumbauer is an SS officer whose watchful cruelty personifies the regime’s predatory power. He cultivates zeal in ambitious boys and recognizes the uses of fanatics like Fritz, recruiting them for secret, lethal missions. A largely static force, he embodies the institutional menace that Michael’s family works to undermine.
Minor Characters
Herr Professor Doktor Major Melcher: Michael’s embittered teacher whose grief after his son’s death at Stalingrad leads to quiet classroom dissent; he’s brutally betrayed by his own students and delivered to the Gestapo—a stark portrait of what happens to those who refuse the party line.
Horst: The boys’ Hitler Youth leader and archetypal bully whose “might makes right” creed catalyzes Michael’s early defense of Fritz and exposes the group’s machinery of intimidation.
Lina Brendler: Fritz’s eerie, childlike sister who imagines bearing “babies for Hitler,” chilling proof that indoctrination reaches even the youngest.
Professor Hendrik Goldsmit: An Allied nuclear physicist targeted for assassination; saving him becomes the culminating test of Michael’s training, nerve, and priorities.
Character Relationships & Dynamics
At the heart of the novel is the shifting bond between Michael and Fritz—a friendship born of protection and belonging that fractures under the weight of ideology and secrecy. Their paths mirror and invert each other: one boy hides compassion behind a uniform, the other hides cruelty behind ambition. The final confrontation asks whether loyalty to a friend can survive loyalty to a cause.
Within the O’Shaunessey family, strategy and love constantly collide. Megan’s calculated risk-taking powers the spy ring, while Davin’s caution strains against missions that endanger their son. Simon enters as the necessary counterbalance—an older-brother mentor whose lessons and sacrifice help Michael reconcile fear with purpose, turning espionage into a moral stance rather than mere survival.
Fritz’s ascent is abetted by Trumbauer and the SRD, where ideological zeal is groomed and rewarded. That same system corrodes ordinary bonds: boys terrorize Melcher, Horst enforces brutality as pedagogy, and Lina’s fantasies reveal how thoroughly the regime scripts private futures. All these currents converge in the assassination plot against Goldsmit, where covert loyalties, family ties, and fanatical obedience collide, forcing every character to choose a side—and live, or die, with the cost.