The fightin' XX chromosomes

Happy New Year!  After a few days of poorly-earned lazing around (and enjoying the unseasonably warm weather), I am back with my first review of 2012.

In May 1944, the French Resistance is attempting to sabotage the German army.  Felicity "Flick" Clairet is leading the Resistance along with her husband, and after a futile attempt to destroy the occupiers' operation, she returns to Britain with a new idea: a trained team of female soldiers could sneak into German headquarters as cleaning women and obliterate their means of communication.  As Flick goes about recruiting potential saboteurs from different backgrounds, she knows that the plan is delicate and fears the consequences if it proves to be disastrous.  And her relationship with her husband deteriorates once she learns that he has a mistress - and that a handsome American soldier is falling in love with her.  Meanwhile, Dieter Franck, a highly skilled German officer stationed in France, is busy collecting information about the Resistance and Flick's role in it.  An adept torturer, Dieter knows exactly how to wring information out of his victims and how to catch Flick once she's back in the country - that is, if the arrogance of the Nazi officers doesn't get in the way.  

This is a book that delivers exactly what you hope it will: a lot of action, suspense, tough characters who survive, and more than a handful of deaths.  Follett structures it so that the events are sectioned off by days - the entire plot is basically confined to a week - which helps to give the reader a sense of the constrictions time imposes on the characters.  Flick is a good main character - smart, feisty, quick, and resilient. We get some backstory on her that, while not all that imaginative, helps us like her - and we certainly start to care about her pretty quickly.  The refined Dieter is, I think, a more interesting character: he doesn't self-identify as a Nazi (he has a Jewish mistress, for whatever that's worth), but is proud to be a German and clever enough to earn our respect.  The most brutal passages illustrate his gift for personalized torture, but we also see how this ability takes a mental toll on him, making him into a more realized character.  Follett uses both characters to show how work politics cause ruffles in each nationality's army, an expected but still appreciated touch.

It's unfortunate that we're not given enough time to bond with any other characters - most notably the titular Jackdaws.  A couple of them are somewhat memorable, such as Ruby the incarcerated killer and Greta the German crossdresser - the latter's motivation for joining the Jackdaws is quite affecting.  But the rest are inconsequential or even downright annoying, and instead of trying to have them transcend their initial stereotypes, Follett simply does away with them.  This, along with his incessant breaking of the "show, don't tell" rule, is an example of lazy writing.  It's too bad, since I know that Follett can be far more compelling and inventive when he wants to.

For the most part, it's quite a decent read.  Both Flick and Dieter are great characters, and the different love subplots offer reprise in this suspenseful war thriller.  Rating: 3.5 coded messages out of 5.