Book Review Column: “The Amazing Literary Adventures of Amber and Eleanor The Cat," and “The Alice Network,” By Kate Quinn

By Amber Ford, The Mountain Times

Since Eleanor has been exceptionally patient with our exploration of different genres of late, I humored her and jumped back into historical fiction with our latest literary adventure. Unique in its backstory, plot, and character development, Kate Quinn’s “The Alice Network” is a tale of heroes, villains, war crimes, historically accurate events, and, of course, love.

With a time frame jumping between World War I to post World War II, readers can not only experience what it was like living in war-torn Europe, but what it was like for a specific group of women risking it all for the sake of humanity and their country, a group of female spies operating via the British government known as “The Alice Network.”

The novel jumps between two female characters, present during both world wars. We are introduced to Charlie St. Clair, an American socialite, who is looking tirelessly for her French cousin Rose Fournier, who hasn’t been seen since Germany invaded France during World War II. Intertwined into her chaotic search is Eve Gardiner, a retired spy of The Alice Network who, as we learn throughout the novel, has her own secretive and dangerous past.

No stranger to historical fiction novels, both Eleanor and I did enjoy this novel with some minor critiques. World War I and World War II historical fiction novels are a dime a dozen. From Anthony Doerr’s “All the Light We Cannot See” to Kristen Hannah’s “The Nightingale” (Eleanor’s personal favorite), it’s hard to keep regenerating storylines that don’t “cross the streams” in terms of content and plot. There is undoubtedly always a soldier who promises to come back and doesn’t, a Nazi soldier with a change of heart, a downed ship or plane with no survivors, and, Eleanor’s least favorite, war-torn lovers, reunited years after the wars have ended, almost always with a love child in tow. And although this novel did have a few of those consistent themes, “The Alice Network’s” use of historically accurate female spies was definitely a twist most historical fiction fans [Eleanor included] seek.

Like the many other gifted historical fiction authors, Quinn did her research when it came to female spies and the powerful roles they played during both world wars. Many characters living within “The Alice Network” have roots planted in historically accurate events. “The Alice Network’s” World War I character and female spy, Lili, is based on the real life heroism of Louise de Bettignies, a French woman who oversaw a spy network of nearly 100 people and was nicknamed “Queen of Spies” by British intelligence. The tactics and missions of the female spies in the novel also showed historical accuracy and merit. Quinn outlines the detailed and rigorous training each spy character in the novel endured before entering the battlefield. The novel echoed the difficulties of European female spies, who were trained at designated secret locations, learning how to pass information on to the Allies in Nazi occupied territories. 

Although “The Alice Network” was not a top five historical fiction novel for Eleanor, it was one of the most historically accurate fiction novels we’ve read in some time. The events that took place post World War II did seem to drag with an inability to connect to the characters. But the World War I storyline, characters, and adrenaline-driven, page-turning moments were definitely worth the read. As with any and all books reviewed from The Mountain Times to The New York Times, don’t take our word for it: go ahead and take the adventure for yourself!