Maggie Hope
and the Maggie Hope series are such favorites of mine that I always fear I
won’t do the books justice in my reviews.
Each book is an amazing read, and the latest, The Queen’s Accomplice,
may be the best of them yet. I not only
love the Maggie Hope stories, I learn so much from them, especially about
women’s roles in WWII. I have moment
after moment of discovery that continues to gobsmack me with the bravery of
women answering the call to duty for their country. In these books, the setting is Great Britain,
so it is the British history that readers learn most, but as an Anglophile, I
find that fascinating. And, let us not
forget that Maggie is an American who decided to stay in England and do her
part for the greater good of what is right that transcends country
loyalty.
The Queen’s
Accomplice starts out tame enough for Maggie, as she is doing desk duty at the
SOE (Special Operations Executive) while she
waits for her half-sister Elise to be rescued from Ravensbruck Concentration Camp and smuggled
out of Germany to London. After having
served brilliantly in different war-time actions as a spy and code-breaker,
including her stint as Churchill’s secretary and a trip to America with
Churchill to encourage America’s entry into the war, the desk job is quite beneath Maggie's skill level. She also must endure an
odious, under-qualified boss who doesn’t know her accomplishments and asks her
to make him tea, with a “dear” attached at the end.
As more
women are deciding to take part in the war effort, the SOE is in charge of
assessing their skills and suitability.
London in its ravaged state after the Blitz has few accommodations for
young ladies traveling to London for their interviews with the SOE, which often
requires an overnight stay. Certain buildings
are being used as temporary “hotels” for these transient women, offering only
the bare bones of an acceptable place to sleep.
When the ugly beast of a copy-cat Jack the Ripper begins to kill those
temporary residents seeking SOE employment, MI-5 turns to Maggie to help their
office and Scotland Yard investigate the horror. Maggie’s personal involvement with training
some of the victims or knowing of their training in Scotland, where Maggie
taught survival skills for a time, makes finding who comes to be tagged the “Blackout
Beast” a matter close to her heart. She
was once a hopeful young applicant, wanting to do her part in the war, and the
fate of being butchered and left in the dark of a London park is beyond tragic
to her. Not everyone is happy with women
stepping up to the plate to help, and this would-be Jack the Ripper has
obviously taken his displeasure to a murderous level of hatred and destruction.
Of course,
the Blackout Best isn’t the only one who doesn’t appreciate women leaving home
to enter a “man’s” world. Sexism is another battle which Maggie is
trying to fight in order to provide equal pay and protection for women
“unofficially” serving their country.
It’s a battle fraught with frustration and dismissal, and full of men
who under-appreciate and undervalue how important women are to winning the war
against Hitler. Denying women the same
rights as men serving puts women and their families in danger, surviving and
financial. Women who are being sent
undercover to other countries, with France being highlighted in this story,
need protection that they don’t yet have to return home safely. Maggie’s friend, Sandra is one such woman
getting ready to leave for an assignment in France.
One of the
best aspects of The Queen’s Accomplice for me was the appearance of characters
from the past, when Maggie moves back into her aunt’s house and has some
familiar roommates, and the creation of new characters with whom Maggie’s very
life could depend. Susan Elia MacNeal
beautifully weaves in the old characters with the new, and gives the readers
great dialogue as always. With the
familiar faces of Chuck and Sandra, her old housemates, readers see the
reinforcement of how women friends support one another. With new characters of Detective
Chief Inspector James Durgin, the Scotland Yard officer with whom Maggie is
working, and Vera, who proves that
age doesn’t define a person’s usefulness, there is a growing community of those
behind the scenes in a worn-torn London.
I always feel that I am walking along with Maggie in the devastation and
optimism, and it is the brilliant characters and deftly described setting that
brings me there.
And how does
the Queen and Buckingham Palace fit into the layers of this story? Well, Maggie is a forever resourceful person,
and the Queen is a mighty fine ally and resource to have.
The main
story is the “Blackout Beast” and his rampage on the young women wanting to
join SOE, but the subplots involving Elise and her struggle to survive and
Sandra’s impending trip to France come together to give a more complete picture
of how the war is being fought on different fronts by different women in
different ways. Susan Elia MacNeal is
one of the best historical fiction writers around, and the addition of mystery
and murder to her stories gives an added satisfaction that is hard to
beat. It’s always hard for me to move on
from a book by Susan because I know I’ve finished one of my favorite reads of
the year, but she provides a wealth of additional reading material in her
bibliography of sources, so that I can continue my connection.
An advanced copy of this book was provided to me by the publisher for an honest review, which the above assuredly is.
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