The Boy at the Top of the Mountain

As THE BOY WHO LIVED AT THE TOP OF THE MOUNTAIN begins, 7-year-old Pierrot is living in Paris with his widowed mother, his father having died three years before. He has a best friend and a beloved dog and memories of the father who drank and suffered from PTSD (though they didn't call it that then) after serving as a soldier in World War I. After the death of his mother, Pierrot is sent to live in an orphanage before being offered a home by his father's sister, Beatrix. He travels alone from France to Germany, where Beatrix works as a housekeeper at Berghof, Adolph Hitler's mountaintop home in Bavaria. Pierrot's name is promptly changed to Pieter and he gradually begins to lose his identity as a Parisian schoolboy with a Jewish best friend. Despite his aunt's efforts, Pieter becomes more and more devoted to Hitler, who shows him the attention the fatherless boy craves. Hitler himself inducts Pieter into the Hitler Youth, and the boy who was bullied at the orphanage transforms into a bully, arrogantly demanding respect and obedience from his aunt and the household staff. One of the few to stand up to him is Katrina, a schoolmate and daughter of a local shopkeeper, who refuses to be either impressed or intimidated by the young Nazi. Will Pieter's blind allegiance to Hitler lead him to make a decision with horrifying consequences?