The King’s Agent (Soldier Spy)
This is the second book of the Soldier Spy series, following on from Traitor’s Game.
The year is 1809. Napoleon is on the throne, but a network of Bourbon monarchists and English agitators is working to unseat if not assassinate him. Will Fraser, a British soldier who had been framed and disgraced in the first volume of the series in an episode that led to his brother’s death, finds himself replacing that brother in the spy ring that is fighting to break through the notorious Joseph Fouché’s security cordon around the emperor. Now their ranks have been compromised, and the French spies must be evacuated to England.
What follows is an old-style Scarlet-Pimpernel-type adventure, in which people are rarely who they seem, one disguise follows another, and our hero and his sidekick are in a heart-pounding race for the coast of the Channel with Fouché’s goons on their heels.
With a cast that mingles historical figures and fictional ones and a geography that reels from London to the Channel Isles and on to Paris, the scene-setting is convincing, but more importantly, the relentless pace of the action keeps the reader breathless until the end. A thoroughly entertaining, classic historical spy thriller. Recommended.
