bookchickdi: The Paris Agent

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Friday, July 14, 2023

Friday 5ive- July 14, 2023

Welcome to the Friday 5ive, a weekly-ish post featuring five things that caught my eye this week. We took a week off to go to Florida, I hope you didn't miss me.

1) We were excited to see two projects completed at our home in Florida. New bookshelves were put in, along with a desk in the office, so you know I enjoyed organizing the books. The only thing that would have been better is if my my two favorite book organizers Anna and Allison were there to help. We also had a new bar area put in the kitchen, and both projects turned out so wonderful.

2) Our JetBlue plane from JFK to Florida was called Bear Force One, with the Boston Bruins logo and colors. I'm not a hockey fan, but I know a few Bruins fans so I sent them a photo.

3) I was on my own for dinner a couple nights this week and when I was debating what to have, an article from CNN popped on my phone about "Girl Dinner". Apparently when women are having dinner on their own at home, pulling out fruit, cheese and crackers for dinner is the latest fad. So I picked up burrata, some grapes and pineapple and added some crackers and proscuitto from my neighborhood Italian grocery store and had a lovely little dinner. Girl Dinner will on my regular rotation- no cooking is involved and in this heat that is a good thing.

4) I ended up spending an extra two days on Florida due to flight cancellations so I made the best of it by catching up on the last season of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel on Amazon Prime. All I can say is Amy Sherman-Palladino and Daniel Palladino know how to wrap up a show. They gave us a glimpse into the future for all the characters and Alex Borstein (Susie) and Rachel Brosnahan (Midge) put on a tour-de-force of acting in the last few episodes that stunned me. If they don't get all the awards, there is no justice. If you've never watched this series, do yourself a favor and watch it now. I loved Midge's Joan Rivers-like NYC massive apartment, a nice tip of the hat to Joan.

5) I read some terrific books lately. Kelly Rimmer's WWII novel, The Paris Agent, tells the story of ordinary British people who became spies to save the world from the Nazis. It is intense and so gripping. My five-star review can be found here.

Speaking of spies, Beatriz Williams' novel, The Beach at Summerly, also has at its core a spy story,but this one is set in the Cold War and with Russians. Emelia's parents have been caretakers for a wealthy New England's summer family home on Winthrop Island on the Long Island Sound. She and her siblings grew up with the sons of the family, and Emilia had a crush on one of the boys. After WWII, the boys' widowed Aunt Olive comes to stay with her young children, and Emilia ends up taking care of the children and growing close to Olive. Her relationship with Olive brings her to the attention of FBI agent Sumner Fox who is looking for someone who is passing along information to the Russians. This one is for fans of the late, great TV show The Americans. I love how Williams' ties this book into her previous terrific novel, Our Woman in Moscow.

I also read Isabel Allende's debut novel, The House of the Spirits. This one was my July Blind Date With a Book -Banned Book Club edition gifted to me by my wonderful daughter-in-law Anna. I can't believe I never read this book before! It's an epic family story, set in an unnamed South American country. Esteban Trueba works hard to build a life of wealth and privilege for his family. He is tough, and sometime violent. Esteban loves his ethereal wife Clara, who is able to connect to the spirits of those who have passed on. Their daughter Blanca falls in love with a man her father forbids her to see, a man whose politics are the complete opposite of Esteban's. As Esteban's political power grows, Blanca grows further apart from her father. Blanca's daughter Alba is the light of Esteban's eye, but as she grows up, she sees the world in a different light than her grandfather and wants to change things in her increasingly volatile country. Written in 1985, ostensibly about Chile, this book resonates with much that is happening right now in the United States. This book is one of the best I have ever read, it has earned a permanent place on my Staff Recommends shelf at the Book Cellar.

Have a safe, healthy week- stay cool.

Friday, July 7, 2023

The Paris Agent by Kelly Rimmer

The Paris Agent by Kelly Rimmer

Published by Graydon House ISBN 9781525826689

Trade paperback, $18.99, 352 pages

As Kelly Rimmer's fascinating novel The Paris Agent opens, four women who are British spies in 1944 were captured by Nazi forces and are now on a train being transferred somewhere unknown.

Flash forward to 1970 Britain where Charlotte and her father Noah are grieving the death of Charlotte's mother, Noah's wife. Charlotte believes that her father was a plane mechanic during WWII, and she is stunned to discover that Noah was actually a top secret SOE spy operative in France during the war.

Noah has been disconsolate lately; he wants to track down the man Remy who helped him when he suffered a serious head injury during the war. He has memory loss from that time and he believes that Remy can help fill in the gaps.

Charlotte finds a professor who is working on a history of the SOE operatives. Perhaps he can find Remy for them, but Noah seems reluctant, even more so when it appears that there was a double agent working for the Nazis who endangered the lives of SOE operatives.

As the story moves back to 1944, we meet two female spies- Chloe and Fleur- as they narrate their stories of how they came to be spies for the British government and the dangerous missions they undertook. Rimmer writes an incredibly tense scene as Chloe and Noah's mission to destroy a Nazi weapons factory is detailed. It's a real nail-biter.

These brave heroes put their lives on the line for the safety of others back home, knowing they could be captured or killed. Those who came home often wanted to put that part of their behind them or were forever haunted by it. Noah was able to put it behind him until he could no longer do so.

I was pulled deep into this story, and although at first it is difficult to keep the characters straight because they use their spy names and real names interchangeably (a chart in the beginning of the book would have been helpful), I could not put this book down.

The characters are so well drawn, we feel deeply for them when they face unspeakable danger and as we draw closer to discovering their fates, I found my heart racing. If you are a fan of WWII novels, like Kristin Hannah's The Nightingale, you'll want to read The Paris Agent.

Thanks to TLC Tour for putting me on Kelly Rimmer's tour. The rest of her stops are here: