The key protagonist in ‘The Partisan’ by Patrick Worrall is a female Lithuanian resistance fighter who becomes a Cold War assassin. How nice to read a thriller set in the Baltic States, a fresh take on war and how to survive it. At the heart of the story is Greta, the partisan. I admired her, and feared her.
An ambitious timeline ranges from the Spanish Civil War to the Sixties Cold War as Greta turns from wartime fighting, one of the Three Sisters, to post-war vengeance tracking down the war criminals on her list and eliminating them. Greta’s story intersects in 1963 with Yulia and Michael, Soviet and English teenage chess champions respectively, and a Soviet plot to win the Cold War. The 1963 chess sub-plot got in the way. Greta is the fascinating character, I wanted to read about her. Her story is thrilling enough.
I couldn’t help but wonder if a more limited reach would help the story’s rhythm. The story jumps around a bit. In the first half I would prefer spending longer with each character to understand them, before the pace picks up as tension rises and point of view gets snappier. I wanted to read about Greta’s story in one long narrative thread instead of a timeline jumping between 1940s and 1963. I particularly enjoyed Greta’s interviews with journalist Indrė in 2004 and was unable to get beyond the jumping around when I wanted to settle in with one character. The character list is long with many similar names to remember – who is on which side, who is double-crossing who – and this took me out of the story.
I’m always partial to a good thriller and like to find debut authors, so I’ll be watching out for the next book from Patrick Worrall. It’s different, try it.
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As usual with my reviews, I will not rehash the plot (if that's what you are looking for, there are already some quite detailed reviews like that out there - but you'd be better off just reading the book!)

This is a complex and intriguing novel, with many strands to it. The action moves back and forth through time, through various locations, and there are a large number of characters involved - all of the above make it quite hard to follow at times (I had to flick back and forth to remind myself who some characters were at times), but it's worth persevering.

I understand that the events featured in this novel are based on the experiences of real partisans, which explains why it feels so authentic. At times this is not a comfortable read, so be warned if you are looking for a "cosier" type of thriller (as it were).

My thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for an ARC. All opinions my own.

5★
“ ‘Even a grandmaster can only think so many moves ahead. A machine sees all the way through to the end. All the different possibilities.’
. . .
‘If Sergei had something big and he’s taken it to one of the capitalist countries, we’ve got a problem. Like suddenly the machine isn’t playing with chess pieces, it’s playing with Germany and Poland. Figuring out all the moves. What chance would our senile generals have against that?’”

The Cold War as a game of chess. You don’t need to know anything about how chess is played or how players sacrifice pieces to gain an advantage. That’s because you will see in real time how the Cold War players sacrifice their real players when necessary. The powers-that-be may even say Sorry, but you know why you have to go. You play the game, you take your chances.

The book opens in 2004 in Lithuania with an elderly woman speaking of her past, hiding and fighting in the forests during WWII as a teen and later tracking down and assassinating old Nazis and Soviets during the Cold War in the 1960s. In the forests, she was the one of the three girls who knew how to scavenge, hunt, and kill – animals for food, enemies for safety.

“Once Greta took the girls, Vita and Riva, foraging for mushrooms in the deep woods. Just to show them which were poisonous and which were good to eat. She knew what to look out for: a blue stain in the flesh, pink gills, or a white ‘skirt’ halfway down the stalk.

Her father used to say that with mushrooms, as with people, a skirt was a sign of impending danger.”

Her own skirt certainly was! She learned young how to take care of herself and make quick work of her enemies and she never let her guard down. There was nothing cold about her war.

“Greta did not like to get too close to people who carried cameras or walking sticks or umbrellas or bicycle pumps in the street. She did not like it when men held out cigarette lighters for her. Soviet ingenuity meant that all these implements might contain a nasty surprise.

It was unlikely that the Russians would try any thuggery in a busy London thoroughfare in broad daylight, but you never knew. In the mid-1950s two agents from what was then the Ministry of Internal Affairs had attempted to snatch her in Paris while she was walking down a shopping street much like this one. Be bold again if you want to, my little friends, she thought. I splashed your blood all over the white paving stones that day, and I will do it again.”

Meanwhile, there is also tenderness and youthful romance in the chess sections of the story where English boy Michael meets Russian girl Yulia at a tournament in London. She is the daughter of Sergei (mentioned in the opening quotation), whom she knows to be somebody important, something to do with military secrets. He writes about chess in the newspapers. She and her father pretty much communicate through chess.

Her mother, Anna, was the first woman to join the Politburo, so Yulia is carefully guarded at all times. When she attends the chess tournament, she is constantly escorted by two menacing men, who actually sleep in her suite at the hotel.

Michael is the son of British Vice-Admiral Sir Stephen Fitzgerald and is immediately smitten when he sees her for the first time at the tournament. They become friends and meet secretly, where he learns something of her background and her ‘escorts’.

“After a moment, he crossed the street and thought: This morning, I was a schoolboy. Now I’m following a group of Russian spies into a hotel. When I go through these doors, nothing will ever be the same again.”

And he was right. As their story continues from one tournament to another, the activities of their parents is central to the theme. The political intrigue moves around Europe, and nobody is safe from the powerful figures managing the spies and assassins.

Lithuania was independent, was taken over by the Soviets, then by the Nazis. As the Nazis weakened, the Soviets moved in again, treating the country like just another pawn on their chessboard.

Chapters move between the years and places and people. I could have used a good cast of characters to refer to and some maps. These were complicated times with Soviets on the side of the Allies, fighting Nazis, but just as viciously dangerous, with the secrecy and prison camps and gulags for which they were known.

The public knows only the official faces of governments and the military, but the real power lies with other slippery government officials like Vassily, a Soviet official who manages to travel freely, but nobody knows exactly why.

“ ‘In the Soviet Union, if you get tired of reality, a new one will come along and replace it. Every new leader ushers in a glorious new past. Na zdrovye!’”

This is a fascinating book (a debut!), even if I struggled a bit with the various allegiances and betrayals. It is a timely read, with so much attention concentrated on Ukraine at the moment, another country that always seems to Russia to be ripe for the picking.

It is also worth having a look at the author’s background - very impressive. He is @FactCheck for Britain’s Channel 4 News. He seems to know his stuff!

Thanks to NetGalley and Penguin/Random House for the copy for review from which I’ve quoted.

What a roller coaster of a debut novel. Switching from WW2 Lithuania to the 60s where spies from Russia and Britain are battling it out, this is a fast paced and highly enjoyable read. All cleverly interlinked, populated by believable characters, this is one to have at the top of your to read pile.

Great read Cold War thriller. Two chess players Michael and Yulia from different sides of the Iron Curtain meet and fall in love. It is a time of great tension and fear. The world could be hurtling to nuclear catastrophe and the two young people find themselves caught up in the game of spies and killers.,
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There can not be a better metaphor for the cold war than the game of chess. But more than the metaphor, of course, was the very real rivalry between the West and Russia across the chess board. Both of these aspects are used by Patrick Worrall in his Cold War debut The Partisan.
There are lots of moving parts in The Partisan. The book opens with a woman called Greta, a Lithuanian partisan during the Second World War who now works with the Israelis, tracking down and killing former Nazis. A thread of the story set in 2004 has Greta telling the story of her war and the two Jewish fellow partisans who she ran with in the forests of Lituania. Back in 1963, young English chess player Michael finds himself at an international chess competition and besotted with Russian chess prodigy Yulia. This is a bit of a Romeo and Juliet situation as Michael’s father is a senior member of the British secret service and Yulia is the daughter of a high flyers in the Soviet scientific and political hierarchy. Yulia and her family are also in the crosshairs of the head of the MGB Karpov, a man who is also on Greta’s hit list for his violent activities after the Russians re-occupied Lithuania during World War 2.
It takes a while for Worrall to get all of his pieces onto the board but once he does the plot plays out like a game of chess. There are moves and counter moves, sacrifices and long term plays. While young lovers Michael and Yulia are in the middle of the action they are more pawns in the hands of much more powerful players. Worrall weaves the pasts of all of the main characters into the narrative, leading to some clever last minute reveals.
The Partisan is a classic Cold War tale, down to the centrality of chess in the narrative. Knowing that a possible nuclear catastrophe did not eventuate does not stop readers willing the characters to stop it or from the tension generally to build. And while some of the action scenes are a little bit muddied this a very engaging thriller.

I struggled a bit with this story. It was a bit to violent for me although I did find it interesting. The depiction of the characters was very good and made it all feel very real.

Patrick Worrall makes a terrific entry into the spy fiction world with his debut novel, The Partisan.

The story is mainly set in the early 1960s, but there are also frequent flashbacks to the Second World War, particularly to the role played by partisans in the forests of Lithuania, and flash forwards to 2004, when one of the partisans, ‘Greta’, is relating the story of her time as a partisan to a member of the Lithuanian ministry responsible for memorials. Also central to the story, is the relationship between Yulia Forsheva, daughter of a powerful Soviet couple, and Michael Fitzgerald, son of the British Director of Naval Intelligence. The pair meet at a chess competition in London in 1961 and subsequently become pawns in a complex game of espionage and power politics.

The story is very complex, and some patience is needed in the early stages, but Worrall steadily and skilfully knits his various strands into a compelling whole that comes together in a series of stunning finales in Spain, London and Sweden. The second half of the book is particularly suspenseful, as the twin storylines in 1961 and 1944 reach their violent conclusions and Worrall offers some unexpected final twists.

The Partisan impresses with the breadth of its scope and its seemingly accurate depiction of the various historical events that it covers. There is also a great deal of poignancy and sadness in Worrall’s portrayal of the horrors of war and the brutality of the Soviet Union in the early 1960s. The characters are fulsome and credible, and very engaging.

At times there seemed to be too much background story, including flashbacks to the Spanish Civil War, but the need for this comes clearer in the final chapters. I also thought that the romance between Yulia and Michael was a little clumsy at first, but this is only a small quibble.

Overall, The Partisan is a very impressive debut that bodes well for Worrall future career as a spy novelist.

Love historical fiction and this is a great example.

The setting is great and the story worthwhile. There is a lot of switching between timelines but it really helps build the story and characters.

Greta was a resistance fighter in Lithuania and now she is hunting again, while Vassily who was the Soviet Union’s spymaster is also looking for people from the past.

Gripping novel that at first seems about two young people meeting and falling in love but neither of them are prepared for what will happen.

An insight into earlier events and how the need for revenge is strong and needs resolution. Read and enjoy.

What a panoramic sweep of a story relating the life forming events of three people to become what they are starting from the impact of WWII on Latvia and Russia. The German occupation of Latvia has opposite effects on two different characters, a boy abused by his father betrays him to the Germans and gets rewarded and becomes a collaborator transferring to the Russian when the Germans are in retreat. The other character is a young girl escaping into the forest when bereft of family, battle harden as a partisan determined to bring to Justice those who massacred friends and family to ultimately become the boy’s nemesis as he develops into an all-powerful mega manic and a sadistic pervert freely supplied with selections of victims by his henchmen. The other strand is of the young wife of a Soviet intellectual who stays behind to rally troops into battle aided by a young major while her husband flees East. How all these strands come together is a complex story with minor roles by the next generation, a Russian Girl and an English boy who have an unwitting part to play. A most absorbing read.

Two young prodigies from either side of the Iron Curtain, Yulia and Michael. meet at a chess tournament in London. They don't know it, but they are about to compete in the deadliest game ever played. Shadowing them is Greta, a ruthless resistance fighter who grew up the hard way in the forests of Lithuania, but who is now hunting down some of the most dangerous men in the world. Men who are also on the radar of Vassily, Perhaps the Soviet Unions greatest spymaster, A man of cunning and influence.

Set in the summer of 1961, around the time of the Cold War. The story revolves around the four main characters, Yulia, Michael, Greta and Vassily. The timeframes continually moving and the various characters makes this book a little confusing until you get into it. The plotline is complex, so it needs all your attention to keep you focused. It can be hard to read in places as there's some scenes of torture and violence, It covers the years: 1940s. 1960's and 2004. This is a really good debut novel.

I would like to thank #NetGalley #RandomHOuseUK #TransworldPublishers for my ARC of ThePartisan in exchange for an honest review.

The Partisan is the very assured debut thriller by Patrick Worrall. This book was recommended to me after I'd enjoyed Robert Goddard's latest book and it's very much in his style.

The action begins in wartime Lithuania with a trio of displaced young girls becoming a feared partisan team as they take to the woods to avoid the German invaders. One of them, Greta ,continues hunting Nazis for years after the end of the war, returning to Lithuania in 2004 to pay her respects to lost friends and tell her story to a journalist.

With Greta's story unfolding in the background most of the tale is set at the height of the Cold War British Intelligence suspecting that an attack by the Soviet Union on Western Europe looking very much on the cards. As tension builds Russian chess protege Yulia Forsheva and British student Michael Fitzgerald meet , fall in love and find themselves in the middle of intrigue,espionage and mixed up in a very high stakes metaphorical chess game between Soviet and British politicians and intelligence services.

This is a great story that keeps the readers on their toes. Many of the characters have ambiguous loyalties and there are plenty of shocks and surprises along the way.
My only criticism is that the story jumps backwards and forwards between timelines and locations it's quite often confusing as to what's going on and when,which does make it a struggle at times.

That aside I really enjoyed the book,great characters,a gripping story-line and just as good as that Robert Goddard book I mentioned earlier, very impressive from a debut author.

‘... they were in the business of settling debts.’

Summer, 1961. At the height of the Cold War, two young people meet at a chess tournament in London. Yulia Forsheva, daughter of Sergei, a scientist and Anna, a powerful member of the Politburo, meets Michael, son of Sir Stephen Fitzgerald, British Director of Naval Intelligence. They fall in love and plan to meet at the chess championship to be held in East Germany. Michael and Yulia meet in Berlin, aided by Vassily a powerful Soviet spy whose role is to protect Yulia.

In 2004, ‘Greta’ is relating aspects of her life during World War II to Indrė Žukauskienė. Now elderly, Greta had been a resistance fighter. She, and two Jewish girls Riva and Vita, had hidden in the Lithuanian forests. Greta sought to avenge their deaths at the hands of German Nazis and has pursued and eliminated Nazis ever since. But Greta is also hunting an influential, elusive Russian she failed to kill during the war. Maxim Karpov, now holding a senior position in the Kremlin, was responsible for killing an entire village of Lithuanians whom he suspected of aiding the partisans.

In his current position, Karpov has plans for Europe. Vassily has plans to thwart him, while Greta plans to destroy him. Yulia’s parents will also be caught up in this plot, as will Michael’s father.

‘In the Soviet Union, if you get tired of reality, a new one will come along and replace it. Every new leader ushers in a glorious new past.’

The story shifts between the 1940s, the 1960s and 2004, between Lithuania, Germany, Russia, England, and Spain and involves multiple characters. While wanting to race ahead to see how the story finished, I had to slow down to understand and absorb its complexity.

A fantastic debut novel, and one of the best Cold War thrillers I have read in a long time.

Note: My thanks to NetGalley and Random House UK, Transworld Publishers for providing me with a free electronic copy of this book for review purposes.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

I tried several times to read this book and each time the I became confused with the many characters and then confused again with the alternating time frames.
However, not to be beaten, I put aside one morning to concentrate on the book and found that once I had read more than 35% the storyline became clearer and the characters found their voices.
some clever espionage tricks mixed with chess terminology kept me reading but to be honest I wanted a faster pace and fewer words.
Worth a try if you enjoy cold war antics and chess.

Wonderful story stretching from WW11 to the mid 60’s with a ruthless partisan at the heart of it. With classic evil Russian agents,the British involved in discrete ways and the Lithuanian heroine on her savage revenge mission this story veer’s from year to year backwards and forwards but it all fits neatly together. It all builds to a glorious climax and is a thoroughly entertaining yarn.

This is a terrific, well plotted debut novel with multiple layers, culminating in a thrilling climax. It’s mainly set in the 1960s during the Cold War but with flashbacks to WW2, particularly to the role played by partisans in the forests of Lithuania.

In 2004, one such partisan, Greta, a member of the formidable team known as the three sisters is relating the story of her time as a partisan to a member of the Lithuanian ministry responsible for memorials. Since the war she has become a skilled Nazi hunter, tracing and killing war criminals. Her biggest hunt however was in 1961 for a Russian called Maxim Karpov, now high up in the Kremlin and known as the Chief Administrator who was responsible for killing a whole village of Lithuanians, suspected of aiding the partisans.

The story starts with the meeting of two young people. Yulia Forsheva, daughter of Sergei, a scientist and technologist and Anna, a powerful member of the Politburo first meets Michael, son of Sir Stephen Fitzgerald, British Director of Naval Intelligence at a chess competition in 1961. They fall in love and plan to meet again at the Chess Finals to be held in East Germany. There Michael meets Vassily, a clever and powerful Soviet spy, who is there to protect Yulia. However, he turns a blind eye so that Yulia can sneak out with Michael for an evening together. Thus, Michael has become an important pawn in a complex game of chess orchestrated by Vassily, designed to thwart Karpov’s plans for Europe. With the chess board populated with Karpov, Greta, Yulia’s parents, Michael’s father, a Cambridge academic and a cast of thugs and spies, the endgame will be played out in a stunning final showdown in Valencia.

I thought the way the multiple threads and timelines were handled and drawn together was impressively handled by a first time author. Although it does require a little patience and concentration to follow all the threads until they come together, it is well worth the effort. The main characters are fascinating and well depicted, particularly Vassily, Greta and the hideous Karpov. I would have liked to have got to know Michael and Julia a little better as well as their parents to have a better feel for everyone’s motives and driving forces, but there is so much in the novel already that it would have been difficult to fit in much more character development. Overall, it is an exciting historical thriller which will delight fans of Russian history and Cold War spycraft, particularly while Russia is once again flexing it’s expansionist muscles with its war in Ukraine.

A cold war thriller that will appeal to readers interested in this historical period. However, I found it a difficult read, too many characters and much switching between time periods. Thanks to netgalley and the publisher for the arc.

A very well written,detailed story that needed full attention or would/ could have become confusing,not a casual bedtime pick up read etc, a very good debut

This is Patrick Worrall's incredible debut, it is an intricate and complex historical espionage novel that primarily focuses on the perilous era of the Cold War in the 1960s, but goes back and forth in time, and includes a glimpse of the future in 2004 in Lithuania with the elderly 'Greta' relating events from her life to Indre Zukauskiene, and what a life it has been. Greta, not her real name, evolves into a powerful and ruthless resistance fighter in Lithuania during WW2, hiding out in the forests with 2 Jewish girls, Riva and Vita, setting out to avenge their killings by German Nazis. In the post-war years, she has been relentless in her pursuit and elimination of Nazis who have escaped justice, although they are not her only targets, in particular she is hunting an influential but elusive Russian target she failed to kill during the war. The story is set in various locations through time, including Lithuania, Russia, Germany, England (Cambridge and London) and Spain.

There are numerous threads and characters that slowly begin to connect with each other, but they may prove to be a challenge for readers to keep up with, so attention to detail is essential to understanding the various twists and events that unfold. Young Michael Fitzgerald secures a place at King's College, Cambridge, a talented chess player, he falls in love with a true chessmaster, the Russian Yulia Forsheva, at a London tournament. Her powerful mother, Anna's position become markedly more precarious when it is assumed that Yulia's father, Sergei, has defected. The difficult Romeo and Juliet relationship is facilitated by Vassily, an adept spymaster caught up in the divisions, intrigue, and machinations taking place within the Politburo, and the deadly European ambitions of Maxim Karpov. The connecting parts of the narrative conclude with a nail biting finale set in Valencia, can the horrors of a European catastrophe be averted?

I found this to be a terrific book, epic in nature, but it is not without its flaws, the constant jumps in time, may test readers to the point they give up on the story. That is such a shame as the timelines and the backstories and history of the many characters could have been organised more coherently and smoothly within the narrative. However, despite this, I was still impressed with Patrick Worrall's debut and his skills in pulling together what appear to be disparate elements of his novel which tragically echo our contemporary realities with Putin and the war in Ukraine. Of the many and distinctive characters that inhabit the pages of this historical fiction, I particularly liked the Russian Vassily who had fought in the Spanish Civil War and had made an enemy of the chief administrator, the deplorable Karpov. This will appeal to fans of European and Russian historical fiction, especially WW2 and the Cold War. Many thanks to the publisher for an ARC.