Starred review from November 2, 2020
Robuck (The House of Hawthorne) delivers an edge-of-the-seat WWII spy story based on the life of OSS agent Virginia Hall. In March 1944, the American operative slips into Nazi-occupied France to organize and arm a resistance group called the Maquis before the D-Day invasion. Ahead of her mission, Virginia, who has a prosthetic leg, is informed by her London-based handlers that her life expectancy is six weeks. Even so, she must be extra careful. The Germans have already distributed wanted posters for the “Limping Lady” and have been looking for her for two years, since the Lyon network she headed was betrayed by a double agent. Now, on her current mission, she has a score to settle with those who plotted to betray her. The Germans grow more vicious after D-Day, as Allied troops, with help from the Maquis, liberate French towns. Robuck vividly captures Virginia’s internal struggle over her obligation to help win the war and her desire for revenge. Skillfully weaving events from the agent’s past with the tension-filled days and nights of 1944, Robuck creates an indelible portrait of an unforgettable hero. Agent: Kevan Lyon, Marsal Lyon Literary Agency.