Kingdom of the Rats

Lubomír Kubík's new novel is set in occupied Prague between 1941 and 1945. The main character is a civil engineer, Milan Metal, who works for the Prague sewerage company, where he is responsible for the maintenance and repair of the underground sewers. One day, he is visited by a former colleague, a Jew, who has been forced to leave his job. He and other Jews know that they will soon be deported from the Protectorate. However, they decide not to surrender all their property and hide it somewhere in the labyrinth of underground sewer tunnels. Milan agrees to help him.
After the assassination of Heydrich, Gestapo investigator Otto Hotmar arrives at the Prague sewerage company with the intention of searching the Prague underground to see if the assassins and their helpers are hiding there. Milan Metal, as an expert on the underground, becomes his guide. It gradually becomes clear that Otto Hotmar is a Prague German who speaks Czech well. He feels the need to discuss political issues with Milan, behaves politely and quite humanely, and is likeable in his own way. Under the weight of fear, Milan gradually enters into an almost friendly relationship, including informal contact with Hotmar's family and his friends from among the Prague Germans. As the war ends, the complicated relationship between the two men and the entire story reaches a surprising conclusion.
The author's thrilling novel convincingly captures the escalating atmosphere of fear in the Protectorate, the various types of Czech resistance, the specific mentality of the Prague Germans, and also touches upon the Prague Uprising. His perspective, however, is not black and white, and the actors in his story are not unambiguous bearers of good or evil, whether they are Czechs or Germans.