In Farleigh Field hits the bookstores today. Here is my review of another outstanding novel from one of my favorite authors.
My Review:
I have been a fan of
author Rhys Bowen's writing for quite some time, having read and enjoyed all of
her Molly Murphy and Lady Georgie series.
I have a few more to go in her Constable Evans series.
It's already impressive that Rhys can write two series a year that
maintain brilliant writing, never slipping into predictability, always evolving. Now, this prolific author has given her eager
readers a stand-alone entitled In Farleigh Field. I knew it would be good, but it is a
stay-up-all-night-reading good. It hits
so many of my favorite reading buttons, with the setting being England during
WWII and the involvement of M15 and Bletchley in a thrilling plot of deception
and daring. So many small cogs in the
big wheels that had to turn for Great Britain to survive the Germans, and Rhys
Bowen places us dead center in the machinations of that survival.
It's springtime 1941
in England, and Dunkirk and the Battle of Britain have already claimed the
lives of many soldiers and battered London and its civilians, too. The men and women who wear the uniform
acknowledging their fighting for their country are respected and admired. However, there are many young people who are
vital to the war effort who must remain silent about their participation and
suffer the attitudes of others that they aren't really doing much to help. In this world of behind the scenes
participation is young Ben Creswell, 21 years old and the son of a vicar. Ben suffered an injury to one of his knees
before the fighting started, and he is to all appearances doing an unimportant
desk job in London. But, Ben is a part
of the central nerve of the war machine, working for M15, and due to his connections
to the Farleigh Estate in Kent and its residents, he is tapped for an
investigation into the death of a parachutist, who falls from the sky into a
field of the Farleigh grounds. There is
much suspicion surrounding the dead man, as he is dressed in a British uniform,
but with too many mistakes on that uniform to be considered anything other than
a spy.
Pamela Sutton, the
third daughter of five daughters of Lord Westerham, owner of Farleigh Place, is
a close friend of Ben's, having grown up with him and played as children on the
estate. She, too, must suffer the appearance
of doing boring clerical work for the war, but she is working at the code
breaking center Bletchley Park, where her talent at discovering the unusual
doesn't go unnoticed. She is given an
assignment to decipher some information that will ultimately lead to a parallel
path with Ben's mission of ferreting out why a German spy would end up in a
Farleigh field. Pamela, or Pamma, as
friends and family call her has long had the attention of Ben Creswell, but he
has never pursued a relationship because she and their other cohort in youthful
adventures, Jeremy Prescott, another aristocrat, had long ago laid claim to
Pamma. Jeremy is a member of the RAF and
recently escaped from a German prisoner-of-war camp in France, now recuperating
at his father's estate at Nethercote in Elmsleigh, Kent. Pamela, Jeremy, and Ben all find themselves
reconnected at home while Ben is pursuing clues to the strange death at
Farleigh.
And, there is
Pamela's sister, Margot, who finds herself stuck in Paris after the Germans
invade and occupy France. Margot's lover
is a member of the French Resistance, and, thus, Margot is herself in danger of
being arrested by the Nazis. Ben is also
tasked with discovering whether Margot or any other member of Pamela's family
may be in collusion with the Germans. It
is hard for Ben to believe that there are English who want the Germans to
invade and the fighting to end by their occupation of England. However, certain aristocrats and others in
England are actually involved in efforts for just such an outcome. The answers Ben needs to discover require
dogged pursuit and belief in the unlikely.
Of course, time is always of the essence and lives hang in the balance
in finding those answers.
Major kudos to Rhys
Bowen in achieving a smashing success with this new novel. It is historical fiction and mystery combined
to their best, a puzzle to piece together in the midst of a war which threatens
to destroy a country and its way of life.
The suspense is first-rate, with the chance of betrayal or discovery
nipping at your heels. The characters
are so well developed that I felt a personal stake in the outcome, and the
parts they play are built upon their relationships to one another. Pamela and her four sisters are all
intriguing in their own right. The plot
is a great puzzler with an unexpected, but absolutely plausible, ending. And, one of my favorite parts of historical
fiction is learning history through the well-researched bits and bobs that we
don't usually read in the history books.
The comparisons and contrasts of how the ordinary citizens and the
aristocratic families dealt with supply shortages and what were considered
hardships by both are most interesting.
In Farleigh Field is sure to be one of the most read books of 2017, and
already one of my favorites.
I received an ARC of In Farleigh Field, which in no way influenced my amazing experience in reading
it.
