ON HITLER'S MOUNTAIN: Overcoming the Legacy of a Nazi Childhood

Hunt's moving, unsettling memoir is part of a literary and historical trend: examining the lives of ordinary Germans during WWII. She was born in 1934 in an intriguing locale—Berchtesgaden in Bavaria, where Hitler set up his headquarters. In fact, in one of her most compelling stories, Hunt recalls sitting in Hitler's lap during a 1941 visit, "suspiciously studying his mustache, his slicked-back, oily hair... while at the same time acutely seeing the importance of the moment." In remarkable detail, she relates the normal parts of childhood (the birth of a sister, going to a new school) interspersed with the extraordinary events (e.g., Hunt's father was one of the first German soldiers killed during the war) of the time and place. The older members of her family and others in the village had vastly differing reactions to Hitler. The author (who now lives in Washington, D.C.) remembers how some teachers said, "Heil Hitler," while others preferred more traditional greetings. She also shows how Nazism pervaded day-to-day life. Although she portrays herself as uncomfortable with the regime, she pushed to join the Hitler Youth, only to leave it in the final months of the war. Those looking for an explanation of the Hitler phenomenon will be disappointed, but readers who want a richly textured memoir of a German girl during WWII will find it here. B&w photos. Agent, Sarah Burnes. (Mar.)