FIVE PAST MIDNIGHT by James Thayer - SIGNED BOOK - ADVANCE READING COPY

April 4, 1945. President Roosevelt is briefed on the war in Europe: 28,000 men, women, and children are dying every day. A group of German staff officers is ready to assume leadership of the Third Reich and surrender instantly. The German SS is preparing a fortified retreat in the Bavarian Alps where Hitler may be able to carry on the war for years.... The president makes the obvious but difficult decision: assassinate Hitler. Immediately. Chosen by America's OSS for this critical and dangerous mission is Captain Jack Cray, an American Army commando with a terrifying combat reputation. He is known and feared across Germany for the stealth and success of his behind-the-lines attacks. Cray is currently a POW at Colditz Castle, a grim poison for hard-core escapees. A coded message orders him to break out of the castle. As Cray fights his solitary and deadly way to Berlin, he spreads a mass of terror and disinformation across Germany. Suspecting Cray's ultimate target, SS leader Heinrich Himmler assigns one man to track Cray down and kill him: Otto Dietrich, who was chief criminal Inspector with the Berlin Police until his arrest for treason. Dietrich is now facing death in a Gestapo prison. Himmler's offer: If Dietrich finds and kills Cray, Himmler will pardon Dietrich and spare him the executioner's blade. If Dietrich fails, the penalty is death. As Cray makes his way across the ravaged landscape of war-torn Germany, he meets a fascinating cast of characters, including Katrin von Tornitz, a beautiful widow who works for the Allies, and whose life is changed when she becomes Cray's reluctant partner in the attempt on the Fuhrer's life Sergeant Ulrich Kahr, the one man who knows the Achilles' heel of hitler's underground bunker, and whose love for his family makes him vulnerable to Cray's demand and Hitler himself, a desperate man who can still summon up ferocious willpower. As Cray moves closer and closer to his final confrontation in Hitler's Berlin bunker, and