14 August 2012

Book Review in Brief: Mr. Churchill's Secretary by Susan Elia MacNeal

Maggie Hope, born in England but raised in America, returns to her homeland to settle the estate of a grandmother she doesn't remember, where she must oversee the sale of her grandmother's house in order to fulfill the terms of the will. In the meantime, things are heating up all over Europe,  Hitler is cutting a wide and lethal swathe across the continent, and not enough folks are raising their voice in protest.

Determined to stay on in London, despite having to give up her PhD program in MIT's mathematics department, Maggie makes friends and takes in roommates to cover her cost of living while looking for work.  She reluctantly takes a position as a secretary at Number 10 Downing Street, knowing that her intellect could be better used as a codebreaker in the War Department rather than typing up the prime minister's memos.

There are two important people in Maggie's life who are not what they seem, and in a race against time, she must crack a German code hidden in plain sight and uncover their true selves before one of them is killed and the other one puts the entire city of London in peril.

I tremendously enjoyed this paperback original, which is the start of a new mystery series.  This book is fun and frothy, offering a little bit of everything: an evocative wartime setting, secret identities, gender politics, light romance, lots of gin drinking, a narrowly-avoided assassination, and a brilliant and saucy heroine.  Don't pick this one up if you're looking for something substantial or are in need of a beautiful prose style, but if you like historical fiction or if you prefer you mysteries to be decidedly soft-boiled, give this book a spin.

NB: I purchased my own copy Susan Elia McNeal's Mr. Churchill's Secretary to read on my summer vacation for lighter antidote to the heavier fiction I brought with me. 

9 comments:

  1. This sounds like the perfect read for me. I love historical fiction, especially books set in England during this time. Thanks for the great review!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Oooh, your review makes me esp excited as I have this in my queue for the fall!

    ReplyDelete
  3. I thought this one looked interesting when I first saw it. I think I prefer to read something with a historical background when I am looking for some lighter reading.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Melody sent me her ARC. I think I will read it after all. She didn't seem to be too crazy about it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It's true--she only thought it was okay. Viva la difference, I reckon! Let me know which camp you fall under...

      Delete
  5. I wanted to read this one but was unable to get an ARC :p so, now it's on my heavily packed WishList :p

    ReplyDelete
  6. Wish I could trade my experience for yours - yours sounds much more fun! Sometimes I wonder if I don't enjoy the lighter books more simply because I read them so fast that nothing gets a chance to really sink in & I end up missing plot/character details. Whatever MY issue is, I'm glad you enjoyed it. :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I'm glad I enjoyed it, too. ;)

      Sorry that it wasn't as much fun for you as it was for me. Maybe the setting in which I read it helped...

      Delete
  7. Your review is intriguing and I'm impatiently waiting for the library to supply me with a copy...

    ReplyDelete

Please, sir, may I have some more? (Comments, that is!)