Liberation
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
Inspired by the true story of World War II's greatest heroine, this international bestseller and "cinematic treat" tells the story of Nancy Wake and the impact she had on the world (Publishers Weekly).
Hero. Soldier. Spy. Leader. Her name is Nancy Wake.
To the Allies, she was a fearless freedom fighter, a special operations legend, a woman ahead of her time. To the Gestapo, she was a ghost, a shadow, the most wanted person in the world.
But at first, Nancy Wake was just another young woman living in Marseilles and recently engaged to a man she loved. Then France fell to the Nazi blitzkrieg. With her appetite for danger, Nancy quickly finds herself drawn into the underground Resistance standing up to Nazi rule. Gaining notoriety as the White Mouse, with a 5-million-franc bounty hanging over her head, Wake rises to the top of the Nazi's Most Wanted list—only to find her husband arrested for treasonous activity under suspicion of being the White Mouse himself.
Narrowly escaping to Britain, Wake joins the Special Operations Executive (SOE) and parachutes into the Auvergne, where she must fight for the respect of some of the toughest Resistance fighters in France. As she and her maquisards battle the Nazis, their every engagement brings the end of the war closer—but also places her husband in deeper peril.
A riveting, richly imagined historical thriller, Liberation brings to life one of World War II's most fascinating unsung heroines in all her fierce power and complexity. This is the story of one of the one of the war's most decorated women, told like never before.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
This thrilling debut from the pseudonymous writing team of screenwriter Darby Kealey and novelist Imogen Robertson (the Crowther and Westerman series), based on a true story, chronicles the heroic wartime efforts of resistance fighter Nancy Wake to undermine the Nazis in France. As the wife of Henri Fiocca, a respected man in Marseille, Nancy has the money and the cover to rescue Nazi prisoners ("Everyone knows I'm just a rich girl with expensive habits," she assures her co-conspirators) and to fund resistance efforts. Her successes earn her a nickname, the White Mouse, and an adversary in Major B hm, a Gestapo agent who longs to uncover the White Mouse's identity. When a vindictive former employee rats out her husband, Nancy flees to England. Determined to get back to France, Nancy trains with the British to prepare for D-Day and encounters men among them who doubt and disrespect her, though she eventually cultivates a loyal team with whom she targets supply routes to Normandy and buys time for fighters who would otherwise be doomed. Her sole weakness is her devotion to Henri, whom B hm captures and uses to bait her. What this book lacks in literary panache and subtlety (cue tragic backstory with a mother who made Nancy believe she "was God's punishment") it makes up for with a fast pace, vivid set pieces, and a believable, larger-than-life protagonist. Featuring plenty of espionage and a memorable female lead, this is a cinematic treat for fans of wartime adventure novels.