Jackdaws
The Pulse-Pounding Spy Thriller from the Multi-million Copy International Bestselling Author of The Kingsbridge Series
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4.2 • 96 Ratings
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- £5.99
Publisher Description
‘One of the great bestselling novelists’ – The Sunday Telegraph
‘Follett is a master storyteller’ – The Times
Jackdaws by Ken Follett is an irresistible novel of the French Resistance, love, courage and revenge set in the Second War War.
A Failed Mission
Two weeks before D-Day, the French Resistance try to destroy a telephone exchange vital to Nazi communications. Heavily defended, the mission fails disastrously.
A Daring Plan
With invasion looming, Flick Clairet, a British secret agent, proposes a daring but perilous new plan. She, along with an all-female team – the Jackdaws – will infiltrate and neutralize the exchange before Allied Forces land in France.
A Race Against Time
However, unbeknownst to Flick, Rommel has assigned a brilliant spy-catcher – Dieter Franck – to crush the French Resistance. And now Franck is closing in . . .
Praise for Ken Follett
‘Follett excels in telling a yarn. Intrigue, double-twists, exciting, satisfying . . . you won’t be able to put it down’ – Independent
‘While grand events and themes are at the core of the novel, it is the richness of the characters and the intertwining of their often disparate stories that steal the show’ – The Sunday Times
‘Few writers can come up with the thrills more effectively than Ken Follett’ – The Guardian
‘Crackles with suspense’ – The Daily Telegraph
‘A sizzling narrative . . . Follett is a master’ – Time
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Returning to the WWII setting of the novels that made him famous, Eye of the Needle and The Key to Rebecca, Follett (Code to Zero) delivers a very entertaining, very cinematic thriller about a ragtag, all-female band of British agents, code-named Jackdaws, sent to blow up a key telephone exchange in France on the eve of D-Day. Well, not quite all female: one "woman" recruited for the job by heroine Felicity Clairet, aka Flick, a major with the British Special Operations Executive, is a transvestite and that's just one among many twists that make this novel such fun. Opposed to Flick and her team are two Nazi villains whose escape from central casting doesn't keep them from playing their parts with zest: suave and urbane Maj. Dieter Franck, a master of psychological and physical torture, charged with breaking the Resistance in northern France, and Sturmbannf hrer Willi Weber, brutal guardian of the chateau that houses the telephone exchange. The action runs over 10 days. After a failed assault by the Resistance on the chateau, an assault that introduces the novel's key players, Flick returns to England, racing the clock to recruit a team of women who can infiltrate the chateau by posing as its French domestics; among her selections are an imprisoned murderess, an aristocrat and that transvestite. The English scenes are interesting enough but lack suspense, which Follett supplies in spades by cutting to France, where Major Franck tracks Resistance members and gets wind of Flick's mission which, when at last underway, will enthrall readers. Adventure, romance, derring-do and a bit too much nasty violence crowd the pages of what promises to be one of Follett's most popular novels ever. Major ad/promo; simultaneous abridged and unabridged audio from Penguin Audio.
Customer Reviews
Really Enjoyable
Really enjoyed this book and you know what you’re going to get with a Follett.
Jackdaws
Disappointingly average and often weak