History written as novel, Highroad to the Stake taps detailed torture and trail transcripts to present the riveting story of the Pappenheimers, a vagrant family of Germany in the 1600s, whose lives turned into night-mare when they were arrested for crimes unknown to them. In the adept hands of Michael Kunze the Pappenheimers' sad tale provides the backdrop for a fascinating study of life in Germany in the early 1600s. Originally published in 1982 in Germany Kunze's work was hailed as the year's most breathtaking nonfiction book. It was a well-deserved accolade. Highroad to the stake is quite simply a superb piece of research and writing. Kunze has taken the more than 250 year oled record of the Pappanheimers case and reconstructed a social history that documents what it was like to be alive in Bavaria at the time.