The Librarian Spy: A Novel of World War II by Madeline Martin

Summary:

Ava is a US librarian who receives an unexpected offer to work as spy gathering intelligence under that guise of continuing to work as a librarian in Lisbon. Elaine is an apprentice at a printing press in France run by resistance members. Both have been touched by the war but find ways to communicate and have hope.

My Thoughts:

I listened to this on audiobook and I found it a little slow. I’m not a huge audiobook listener so maybe that’s why but I just didn’t find that this story held my attention.

I think the story was interesting and historical fiction can be slow paced at times. It was interesting listening to two different perspectives seeing how the war was affecting different parts of the world. 

Between the switching perspectives and the day to day lives of the two main characters, I felt like the story wasn’t progressing at times unless something major occurred. 

I think this is a beautiful historical fiction story but the characters and the storyline weren’t as strong as I would have like them to be. Overall, I think it’s a good story but one that would mainly only appeal to historical fiction lovers.