First and foremost, this IS NOT a book about Anne Frank. She isn't even mentioned. Not once. This book tells the story of Gerard Kremer Sr, who was a caretaker at a building across the way from 263 Prinsengracht. Now, in and of itself, his story is another one of those fascinating tales of bravery and selflessness that deserves to be told - a normal man who takes extraordinary chances to aid the Dutch resistance and Jews in hiding during WW2. This is the only reason I haven't just given this book a 1 star rating. He, like so many others, deserves recognition and I find it incredibly sad that his own son wouldn't think to advertise the book as him standing up and proudly declaring that this is his father's story.

Yes, there is a proposal in here as to who may have been the person to betray the occupants of the Secret Annexe. But it is not central to the story by any means. The office building and Annexe are mentioned in passing a couple of times, but no-one in Kremer's story has any direct relationship or contact with Anne or the other occupants, or even truly knows they exist. The deeply cynical part of me believes that invoking Anne's name is something of a marketing ploy to sell more copies, which I find deeply annoying and disrespectful.

Unfortunately, there's not much to redeem the book either. The writing comes across like a pre-teen's creative writing assignment; while it gets the point across, the phrasing is stilted and simplistic, with lots of repetition and childish descriptions. Now, this can be forgiven if the author wrote the book in English despite the fact that it's not his first language, although of this is the case I do wonder where on earth the proof-reader and editor was on the day the manuscript was turned in. Alternatively, if what I was listening to was an English translation from a Dutch original, I'm guessing it's an almost literal translation and, again, perhaps those who worked on the book behind the scenes could have used a bit of a prod to make significant improvements. 

It almost comes across as being a book for children, but at the same time I genuinely can't tell who this book is aimed at. There are moments that seem to call for strong language where the exclamations are watered down and the flow of the text has the feel of a book you'd sit and read aloud to or with a child who's starting to learn about WW2. But then in other sections the swearing does come out and suddenly it's not a book for young children at all!

It's written in a 'fact as fiction' style - the events described are all true, but it's written in a the form of a novel. I can see why it was done in this way - it's a personal story and, while it would probably only merit a page or two in a non-fiction tome, by presenting it as a story so many more little details can be included to flesh out the people involved and give you insights into their thoughts and feelings. The writing does severely let it down, but you do get that personal touch of a son honouring his father within the pages. 

I was also not a huge fan of the narration on this. The narrator was very clear and had a good voice to listen to, but there were odd pauses throughout, it didn't sound to me like he had a good grasp on pronunciation of Dutch and German words (he could say them, but was very much an English person trying to wrap his tongue round them rather than projecting confidence like a native), and overall it just didn't work for me. 

Personally, I would retitle the book and rework the narrative to make sure that Gerard's story is the one readers are thinking about, rather than have them effectively skimming the book until they find the (non-existent) mention of Anne. 

Interesting, but very disappointing.