I have to admit it took me quite a while to really get into this one. I'm not sure why; perhaps it took me a while to really engage with the main character but eventually I was swept along with the non-stop action and really wanted to see how things would turn out.

Set in Europe in the confused days towards the end of the 1930's the book tells of Luke Hamilton, an RAF pilot. Adopted as a child he remembers with great fondness Sister Agnes, the nun in the orphanage who had a huge influence on his early life. When he hears of her violent death in what was described as, 'a burglary gone wrong' he little realises that this is just the part of something that will change his life completely.

There is a lot of action and intrigue in this story and the author paints a vivid picture of Europe t this time as well as creating some pretty dreadful villains! I'm glad I kept reading. Thanks to Netgalley & the publishers for giving me the chance to read & review it

Unfortunately I was unable to finish the book so will not be reviewing

Thanks netgalley for this ARC.

Awesome, fast-paced, twists/turns, and a love story make this unbeatable.

A fast paced rattlingly good yarn set in pre=Second World war Europe. The action is fast and furious from the exhilarating opening chapter and the excitement never relents.

You identify quickly with the hero, Luke Hamilton who is now an intelligence officer at the British Embassy in Paris. Somebody wants to kill him and he and we, the readers do not initially know why. he flees across a Europe preparing for war and after a series of murders and adventures all is revealed and the reader can finally pause for breath.

Exciting and well written and researched.

I think the problem I have with books like this, historical thrillers, is that I'm always unintentionally comparing them to Aly Monroe's Peter Cotton series, which is incredible. Thus, whenever something of this genre isn't quite as good, it is compounded by the comparison.

That being said, I think saying this is only not quite as good does someone a disservice. Because, honestly, this is very much not as good. I had high hopes for it - the plot starts straightaway, which I appreciated, with 4 people (at least) being killed in the first 20-odd pages. And really, it's not the plot I had the problem with; it was the writing mostly.

Throughout the book, the pacing seems off. After the initial burst of action at the beginning, everything slows down. And then there's another burst of action, and then it slows down again, and this pattern repeats right until the end. It's not necessarily a bad thing, but it just doesn't seem to fit with the genre. I was expecting a lot more action-packed a novel. There's also the fact that everything seems to be broken up with flashbacks or reminiscences, which further slow the pace down. Now, they would be fine in moderation, but they're used every time the author introduces a new character, whether they'll appear again or not. And that's just not necessary. I don't need a three page backstory explaining the actions and motivations of a character who won't show up again after they've done what the plot requires them to. It also meant there were a lot of POV switches too (or rather, the focus moved between a lot of characters, as it was in third person). I felt it would have been better to pick one or two and focus on them.

The writing was also not as high quality as I expected. I mean, for sure, it wasn't the worst writing I've read, but there were definitely some lines which had me rolling my eyes and cringing, like "It wasn't Luke's first ever meal in Italy - that, presumably, had been taken at his mother's breast - but it felt as though it was."

And to top it all off, there were just long durations of the book for which I was bored. Like, bored-out-of-my-mind bored. Like, almost-gave-up-on-it bored. It just wasn't for me. Hence, the 1-star.