Summer reading: ‘The Book Spy’ set in Lisbon is covert tale of Europe during World War II
Looking for something to read this summer?
The latest book from international bestselling author of historical fiction novels Alan Hlad, who currently divides his time between Ohio and Portugal, transports readers from the New York Public Library to Portugal’s city of espionage in a thrilling, riveting tale.
“It’s a story of love and hope for better times,” Hlad recently told the Lusa news agency, when describing his fourth historical novel “The Book Spy.”
The story revolves around an American librarian, a Portuguese bookseller, and a mission to change the tide of World War II.
“You’re not spies,” Marie Alves’ new boss tells his trainees in the Interdepartmental Committee for the Acquisition of Foreign Publications, the cumbersome name for a government intelligence agency. But she is going to be a spy.
Maria, the daughter of photojournalists, lives in New Jersey and commutes to her job at the New York Public Library, where she works transferring newspapers to microfilm. Despite the title, her job has little to do with books. Her mother was killed while covering the Spanish Civil War; her father works as a freelancer.
In May 1942, Maria’s co-worker tells her that he’s been accepted into the new program and will be stationed in Europe to obtain and microfilm foreign publications. Maria expresses interest, but Princeton alumnus Roy tells her that the program accepts only Ivy League graduates; Maria, with a master’s degree from Berkeley, is offended and begins an unsuccessful campaign to join the team. Finally, with a combination of duplicity and audacity, she is accepted.
In neutral Portugal, Tiago Soares runs a bookstore that is mostly a cover for his operation providing forged and altered documents for Jewish refugees. He tries to persuade his grandparents to leave their vineyard in France, where they hide escaping Jews in the barrel-aging caves. A pro-German official comes by now and then to search the shop and threaten Tiago, becoming increasingly menacing.
Maria’s cover story is that she’s collecting publications for the Library of Congress, “preserving records of the present world crisis.” And if she should just happen to find directories of German munitions factories, that would be so much better. Again: “You are librarians, not spies.”
When Maria and Tiago meet, each inspires the other to more daring missions. Maria defies her orders to get involved in the highest reaches of Nazi establishment. Those readers interested in history may see one of the major events coming, but there are others that will come as surprises.
Hlad told Lusa the novel aims to “show what the Jews went through during World War II, but history repeats itself and today we are faced with the war in the Ukraine and the flow of refugees” seeking better living conditions in Europe, coming from emergency situations and trying to survive hunger, war and also authoritarian regimes.
The author noted the United States sent librarians undercover to gather intelligence during World War II, as part of what was known as the Intergovernmental Committee for the Acquisition of Foreign Publications (CID).
“This committee did exist,” Hlad said. “In fact, the novel is based on real facts.”
He said the idea of writing the novel came from reading an article about this special section of the US secret services, and he wanted to “talk about the role of Lisbon at that time.”
Experts in microfilm, the librarians were deployed to neutral cities like Lisbon, where they would acquire enemy publications as a way of attaining data from the Axis powers, which were then handed over to US intelligence for analysis.
“The Book Spy” (376 pages, softcover) costs $12.60 from Amazon. Hlad’s other books include “The Long Flight Home,” about the Allied War Pigeon Service,” and “Churchill’s Secret Messenger,” about a typist recruited for a sabotage operation.
Lusa and USA Today material used in this report
This article originally appeared on The Herald News: ‘The Book Spy’ set in Lisbon is covert tale of Europe during World War II
