‘A Hero of France’

In his latest historical spy novel, Alan Furst brings to life the French Resistance in the City of Light during 1941. Bombers are being sent from England, and numerous English flyers are brought down in enemy territory who need assistance to get back home so they can fly again.  Mathieu heads up a Resistance cell that guides the flyers from France to Spain, then to England.

Mathieu is very careful to protect the identity and work of the members of his cell and his various contacts in the city. Upon discovery, the cell quietly dissolves, and the members are able to either escape or turn their lives in a different direction. Furst’s meticulous recount brings the streets and shops of Paris to life and provides romance and accounts of daily living in Paris and France during the German occupation. n — Review by Harriet Leitch

By Alan Furst Random House May 31, 2016 Hardcover $27 256 Pages

‘Underground Airlines’

“Underground Airlines” by Ben Winters is a work of speculative fiction looking at the United States if the Civil War was never fought. The novel takes place in present times with four states that are still slave states, known as the “hard four.” The main character, Victor, works for the U.S. Marshals Service. Victor is a young black man who still has memories of his childhood on a plantation but now hunts runaway slaves. Work takes Victor to Indianapolis in search of Jackdaw, a runaway slave. It is on this trip that Victor looks to infiltrate the local abolitionist cell called the Underground Airlines. In classic detective noir fashion, the more Victor digs into the Underground Airlines, the more he comes to question the world around him. This is a good mystery crossover title. “Underground Airlines” is summer reading at its finest. n — Reviewed by Hunter Gillum