Last the best of all the classics...

 

I've read some really good classics this year, but I think The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Orczy is my favorite. It's such a fun adventure! Set in 1792 during the Reign of Terror, the story takes place in England and in France, both places I'd love to visit someday. (Which is why I chose this book for my "Classic set in a place you'd like to visit" for Karen's Back to the Classics Challenge.)

Lady Marguerite Blakeney and her husband, Sir Percy, are at the heart of this novel. She's beautiful, clever, and French. He's handsome, wealthy, and English. But though they had a passionate courtship, "Now they had drifted quite apart, and Sir Percy seemed to have laid aside his love her, as he would an ill-fitting glove. She tried to rouse him by sharpening her ready wit against his dull intellect; endeavored to excite his jealousy, if she could not rouse his love...but all in vain. He remained the same, always passive, drawling, sleepy, always courteous, invariably a gentleman..."

Added to the events of their life together in England, are the daring intrigues of the Scarlet Pimpernel, the mysterious and dashing Englishman who has rescued countless French aristocrats from the guillotine. His brave exploits are the talk of London. But who is he? Lady Blakeney is about to find out. 

I loved this book! It's captivating, amusing, clever, and diverting. And it reads fast. Why couldn't I have read this classic in high school? I'm so glad I read it now. It's the best.

Happy Reading!

Sleeper 13 by Rob Sinclair

 

When Aydin Torkal was nine, his father took him to Afghanistan to be trained to fight the infidels. At the Farm, he and fourteen other young boys were taught to kill. They called him Talatashar, number thirteen.

Now grown, Aydin has been stationed in Paris, one of thirteen militants about to pull off a series of deadly attacks across Europe. He doesn't know all the details; he doesn't even know where his other twelve brothers have been sent. Then his sister, Nilay, who's been searching for him for years, is killed in Syria, and Ayden knows that it had to have been one of his brothers who was order to kill her because she was getting too close to the truth. So he leaves Paris to go in search of the man who murdered his sister.

"...all of the others, they were out there, and Aydin was damn certain they all wanted him dead. They would come for him .... again and again to kill him .... and they would harm anyone who got in their way. If he ran he had no chance. What he needed was to fight back. It was time to use his hatred. It was time to become the hunter."

The other main character in this novel is Rachel Cox, a British SIS agent in MI5. She's been hunting for any information on the thirteen militants for years, but she can't find any real proof of their existence until Aydin, or Talatashar, breaks ranks. His defection just might lead her team to the other twelve in time to stop the deadly attacks. If she can get to him before his brothers do.

Sleeper 13 is an entertaining read with lots of action and suspense. It has a similar vibe to the Jason Bourne movies and the Orphan X books (although it's not quite as good). I liked how strong and determined Rachel was, even when she didn't get any support from her superiors. And Aydin? He's a conflicted yet ultimately sympathetic character. I liked him, too. All in all, this was a fun read. I look forward to checking out the next book in this series.  

Happy reading!

 

A bookish adventure...

It's 1814. Napolean has just been exiled to Elba and 16-year-old Georgiana Fitzwilliam is facing her own exile to Stranje House. Which really isn't fair. She didn't mean to burn down her father's stables; she was only trying to formulate some invisible ink when things got a little bit out of hand. And now, for her crime of having a scientific and curious mind, she's being sent away to Emma Stranje's School for Unusual Girls. But Stranje House is much more than a reform/finishing school for unmarriageable young ladies. And Georgie is about to embark on her most exciting adventure yet.

"One thing I knew for certain. My life would never be the same. Maybe that wasn't such a bad thing. I glimpsed something, something shimmering with possibilities. Maybe, just maybe, Stranje House would be a way out of the tight-lidded box into which I'd been born."

There's A LOT to like about Kathleen Baldwin's A School for Unusual Girls. It's entertaining, and unexpected, and full of humor and romance. All the girls at Stranje House are exceptional in very unconventional ways:  from picking locks, to training rats, to making Holmesian deductions, to dissembling with a curtsy and a smile. I liked all five girls, especially Georgie and Tess. And I enjoyed all the secrets and spies, too. Stranje House is the place to be if you're looking for some fun and adventure. I can't wait to read the next installment in this YA series.

Happy Reading!

  

(P.S. Happy PI Day!) 

Istanbul Intrigues

During World War II, Turkey 'teemed with spies
defectors, diplomats, assassins, journalists,
and a future pope.'

Here are a few snippets from this very interesting non-fiction read by Barry Rubin (that I bought at least ten years ago but never read until now):

• Istanbul was Germany's backdoor to the Middle East and the Allies' secret passageway into occupied Europe. It became a center of espionage and intrigue for both sides.
• No less than seventeen foreign intelligence services operated in Turkey during the war. The stakes were high, and the measures taken were desperate.
• Istanbul was no place for the innocent or unwary. Over 200 people made a living by wholesaling information to both sides and retailing it to journalists.
• Diplomats of opposing sides who had been poker-playing friends until war broke out now looked through each other without a flicker of recognition.
• Angelo Guiseppe Roncalli, a poor Italian priest who would later become Pope John XXIII, was assigned as the Vatican's legate and apostolic vicar to Istanbul's few Catholics during this time period.
• The only way the Allies could profit from Turkey's neutrality was to use the country as a secret base for gathering intelligence and supporting European resistance movements. These missions had to be accomplished in a way that would avoid any provocation which might make the Germans attack or the Turks expel the Allies
• "Few people realize how very difficult Turkey's position is and how dangerous a game she has been playing. ... Turkey has rendered her greatest service to the Allied cause by retaining her precious neutrality."

Happy Reading!