City of Spies - Mara Timon
About the book
LISBON, 1943: When her cover is blown, SOE agent Elisabeth de Mornay flees Paris. Pursued by the Gestapo, she makes her way to neutral Lisbon, where Europe's elite rub shoulders with diplomats, businessmen, smugglers, and spies. There she receives new orders - and a new identity.
Posing as wealthy French widow Solange Verin, Elisabeth must infiltrate a German espionage ring targeting Allied ships, before more British servicemen are killed. But, the closer Elisabeth comes to discovering the truth, the greater the risk grows. With a German officer watching her every step, it will take all of Elisabeth's resourcefulness and determination to complete her mission.
But in a city where no one is who they claim to be, who can she trust?
About the author
Raised in New York, Mara Timon moved to the UK almost 20 years ago; and fell in love with London and the way it melds the old and the new. Growing up with one parent fascinated with literature and the other with history, she started writing from an early age, although it wasn't until a programme on the BBC caught her interest, and one 'what if' led to another, that her first book began to take shape.
Discover more about the book and author
Visit the author’s website
Watch this panel of crime writers including Mara Timon
Read this Q and A with the author.
Read this review on the blog tour.
Our Librarians’ Reviews
City of Spies is nothing if not action-packed. We meet our protagonist, undercover as Cécile, in the middle of a failed rendezvous with Resistance agents in occupied Paris. Soon, she’s on the run, and by the time she gets to Portugal there’s already an impressive trail of corpses in her wake. This rapid pace keeps up most of the way through, and will have you turning the pages compulsively until the end.
It’s a book driven by plot rather than character, with a tell rather than show approach. Though written in the first person, the author withholds information about her narrator – we do not even learn her real name until quite late on. This certainly contributes to a sense of the emotional distance required of undercover agents, but it also means that the narrator comes across as somewhat one-dimensional and many of her actions seem strangely undermotivated.
WW2-era Portugal, where most of the action takes place, is a fascinating setting peopled with informers, smugglers, double-agents, patriots, and socialites. It’ll leave you wanting to know more (and go on holiday). Against this backdrop, the events that unfold are gripping enough to make up for any lack of subtlety in the telling.
Reviewed by Liz
"What a gripping read! This debut novel by Mara Timon, is a fast- paced thriller. The action takes place in 1943, as SOE operative, Elisabeth de Mornay, flees France after her cover is blown, landing in neutral Portugal to begin another intrepid mission.
Lisbon is a melting pot of different nationalities, French, German, British, and a hotbed of intrigue, a city where no one is who they seem. Elisabeth assumes the identity of Solange Verin, a wealthy French widow, and begins her new mission to infiltrate a German espionage ring in a bid to foil their smuggling operations and save the lives of British servicemen.
There are adventures aplenty and the book continues at a lively, sometimes relentless pace. Elisabeth is an engaging character; feisty, resourceful, brave and undaunted by most situations. Her blossoming love affair with a German Intelligence Officer is neatly entwinned into the story.
The cast of characters is wide, with a blend of real and fictional people; the list at the front of the book is invaluable.
If you enjoy well-written historical fiction, with plenty of adventure and intrigue, then pick up this book and start reading, you won’t be disappointed!”
Reviewed by Lindsay
‘They say Portugal’s neutral. But there’s a lot happening. Under the surface…’
Mara Timon’s debut novel City of Spies is a tense and intriguing historical fiction read. Set during World War II, it follows the main character Elisabeth de Mornay, an SOE agent in Paris when the novel opens. A compelling, action-packed opening section which I particularly enjoyed sees her fleeing Paris and ultimately taking on a new undercover role in Portugal. I admit I knew very little about Portugal during WWII; a neutral country, and yet, as depicted in this story, spies, smugglers, danger, drama and suspicion on both sides were rife there, and the constant sense of wondering who to trust is tangible in this story. The pace slows a little after the drama of the opening, then the tension builds again towards the end, and there is a romantic strand to the tale as well as the political intrigue and espionage. The author has clearly researched the period and the location in depth, and the sense and atmosphere of the place and the period comes through in her writing. The historical note at the end of the book is very interesting and sheds more light on the author’s process and the choice of this backdrop.