Dr Max Aue is a family man & owner of a lace factory in post-war France He is an intellectual steeped in philosophy literature & classical music He is also a former SS intelligence officer & cold-blooded assassin He was an observer & then a participant in Nazi atrocities on the Eastern Front he was present at the siege of Stalingrad at the death camps & finally caught up in the overthrow of the Nazis & the nightmarish fall of Berlin His world was peopled by Eichmann Himmler Goering Speer & of course Hitler himself Max is looking back at his life with cool-eyed precision; he is speaking out now to set the record straight