Death in the Mind

This novel, published in 1945, reads like a series of Homeland, except for the fact that it's set during the Second World War. The main premise is that the Nazis are using hypnotism to turn Americans into Nazi operatives. The novel begins with an American submarine commander firing torpedoes into an American ship in an English harbour. The American and British security agents are asked to investigate. The central characters are two agents, John Evans, who is leading the investigation, and his girlfriend, Madeleine Sawyers, who appears to have been turned by the Nazis.

The author, Richard Lockridge (born 26 September 1898), wrote this novel with the assistance of George Estabrooks (born 16 December 1895), a psychology professor with an expert knowledge of hypnotism. Lockridge grew up in Missouri and attended the University of Missouri. He briefly served in the navy in 1918 and returned to naval service during the Second World War, working in the Navy Public Relations Office. He was a drama critic for The New York Sun from 1928 to 1943. His first book, a biography, was published in 1932. His first detective novel was published in 1940 and he went on to write more than 60 similar novels, many in collaboration with is wife Frances. They won an Edgar in the Mystery Writers Association's first annual awards in 1945.

The novel begins by setting the scene for the event that sparks the investigation:
“Things were not going well for the Allies that day in late September of 1942 — they were not going well anywhere. In North Africa things went badly and Rommel’s tanks rumbled up to the line the British held only some fifty miles from Alexandria. They rumbled rapidly... Things went badly in North Africa and they went badly in Russia, where the Germans and those who followed them were snarling into Stalingrad. The Allied world awaited news which seemed inevitable. When Hitler screamed that Stalingrad would surely fall there were very few people in the world... who doubted him.”