The gripping true story of the woman who became the Gestapo’s most wanted spy In the early 1930s, Nancy Wake was a young woman enjoying a bohemian life in Paris. By the end of the Second World War, she was the Gestapo’s most wanted person. As a naïve, young journalist, Nancy Wake witnessed a horrific scene of Nazi violence in a Viennese street. From that moment, she declared that she would do … she declared that she would do everything in her power to rid Europe of the Nazis. What began as a courier job here and there became a highly successful escape network for Allied soldiers, perfectly camouflaged by Nancy’s high-society life in Marseille.
Her network was soon so successful – and so notorious – that she was forced to flee France to escape the Gestapo, who had dubbed her “the white mouse” for her knack of slipping through its traps. But Nancy was a passionate enemy of the Nazis and refused to stay away. Supplying weapons and training members of a powerful underground fighting force, organising Allied parachute drops, cycling four hundred kilometres across a mountain range to find a new transmitting radio – nothing seemed too difficult in her fight against the Nazis. Peter FitzSimons reveals Nancy Wake’s compelling story, a tale of an ordinary woman doing extraordinary things.
For fans of A Woman of No Importance and Code Name: Lise comes the true story behind the historical fiction novels Code Name Helène and Liberation.
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interesting woman about whom I did not know much. The books has long stretches of WWII boilerplate, K-19 level, that can be skipped.
History at its best and truth above all.
Terrific book on a great woman of courage and intelligence.
Great read!
After reading Nancy’s story, I can’t help but realize that her childhood was the result of her tremendous resilience in the times of adversity. Admire what she stood for in regard to supporting the abused under Hitler? Yes indeed.
The times were full of peril with none of the helps we enjoy today. Nancy let nothing deter her ambitions, such a brave person. I couldn’t help but wonder if all that was portrayed by Peter FitzSimons wasn’t embellished and for that reason, I would like to read Nancy’s story in her words.
Never the less, she did do a brilliant trick of fooling the enemy in the most heroic tasks. She learned to handle the monstrosities seen with her head of logic rather than a heart of compassion, which was needed. This brought her endless success in the long run.
A magnificent woman with incredible stability and endurance. A GREAT STORY.
Informative and history that one doesn’t find in history textbooks.
A revalation of what went on during the resistance in France in WW2.
Great chronicle of Second World War by a person who participated throughout all the events and survived.
A truly amazing woman who did extraordinary things in WW11.
Wish there was more related to her personal life. But this was a great introduction to a remarkable women I knew nothing abut before I read the book.
This book is a biography that reads like a suspense novel. I kept me at the edge of my seat the entire way.
This is a story of the many feats of a great heroine of WWll! Nancy was so brave. I had never heard of her so I was happy to find about about her work in the resistance. It was also amazing to know that after the war, those who have given of themselves without reservation, are not always rewarded with good employment in the secular world.
Though I enjoyed this novel I got a little tired of all the descriptions of battles fought.
Fabulous
Great historical Information with fascinating characters
It’s amazing what a woman in the 1940s, against all odds, accomplished.
I did not realize how effected the French underground was during the second world war and how much the British help to supply them with arms and training.
Nancy Wake and her team were the ones on the ground to make this an organized fighting force. This book explains all the hard ships living in the forest during all kinds of weather, which was brutal to say the least. We have to admire what these individuals went through fighting the Germans so we have freedom today, because they took the pressure off our fighting men so they could get a foot hold on French soil. I wonder how many allied solders they saved?
This was a well written non-fiction book about a true heroine of the Second World War. Amazing series of events that changed history.
Amazing. Nancy Wake is a woman more people should know about!
What a woman.
This is a true story of an Australian lady, she marries a Frenchman and lives in France during WW 11.
Nancy helps all the allies she can by secreting them away from the Germans .
She is a SOE and becomes a leader in the French Resistance.
The book details some of her escapades, cycling 400km in 4days just to get a message to London as she needed a new radio.
No punches are held about the brutality from the Germans, some have given me nightmares.
At the end of the war she was highly decorated by the British, French and American governments but she died before she was awarded an Australian medal.
I give this book 5 stars.
One of those WW II stories that we never hear about. I am glad someone wrote about Nancy Wake so she wouldn’t be forgotten.