📖
REVIEW
I was excited to return to the Bletchley Park Girls Series by Anna Stuart after thoroughly enjoying book 1. This author without fail delivers powerful, well-developed, researched stories. And I can say most sincerely, I was pinned to the pages of her latest offering. Time evaporated as I fell into step with the characters while they moved from one event to the next. I was dying to see the outcomes (both personal and military). It was a satisfying journey to pick up where the first book left off with best friends and co-workers Steffie, Ailsa and Fran along with their love counterparts Matteo, Ned and Valerie. They each continue fighting the war on various fronts. Their determination, will and drive to defeat the enemy shines in Code Name Elodie which ramps up even greater when heartbreak hits. And with D-Day in their sights, they muster up every ounce of strength they can to see victory on the horizon. But victory will come at a cost, for war is predictable in that it always snatches innocent lives on the path to freedom. So, who will be left standing?
I continued to admire Steffie, Ailsa and Fran throughout book two but just as in book one, I was particularly taken with Ailsa. She is a girl with a Celtic heart, a warrior that often runs ahead of danger and ignores practicalities. Her passion to persist and defeat enemies and overcome obstacles are a pleasure to watch. I admire her for her love of love, too, sacrificing sometimes her own safety to be with or help those she deeply cares about. She is not a single woman now. Ailsa is married to a man she met on a previous mission who, I’d say, is a great match for her. Now, we learn she is pregnant but her husband has been shipped off to Ceylon and he does not know of their bundle of joy brewing. She utilises her will and skill to fight the enemy and combines it with her great love and devotion to her husband to be with him again. And being resourceful, she finds a way. I loved watching her part of the story unfold. Her courage is like the fierceness of the strong salt winds of Scotland. Ailsa still stands as my favourite Bletchley Park Girl.
Steffie’s story has its challenges. Her father’s position as a major general has most likely been a blessing and a curse for her. She is expected to understand the sacrifices imposed by war and be strong: to wait. Her own language abilities come into play once again as she is sent abroad to help but what she finds there, is not what she expects. And the revelations will change her heart forever. Though a friendship develops that will sustain her through the rough patches.
Literature-loving Fran (from a family of medics) also faces upheaval and her heart will become tossed like a wave on a troubled sea. She constantly hears a mantra in her mind over and over, once spoken to her in the heat of an argument: ‘perhaps it is better, in wartime, not to love at all.’ Will she embrace this thought or throw all caution to the wind in the end when threatened with loss? On the work skills front, her desire to be a journalist still thrives in her soul. The outcomes for her are appropriate. When D-Day comes, there is more than one turning of the tide event for her.
This is a beautifully written, thoroughly researched WW2 novel by Anna Stuart and a great addition to her Bletchley Park Girls Series. I have not mentioned the title or what it means but can say emotions run high throughout and peak in the latter section with a dangerous mission linked to D-Day and Valerie’s connection to the Elodie Code. Fran fears for her partner’s safety and there are some hair-raising, heart-in your-throat moments in this passage that change the course of many lives.
I won’t say more but this is a must-read novel that will keep you on the edge of your seat. Some parts will make you cry. You may even feel frustrated at the battles women faced at that time. But the beautiful sisterhood theme is empowering, forcing the negatives to fade into the background. I loved Code Name Elodie and highly recommend it. 5 Stars ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Thanks to Bookouture and Netgalley for a review copy.
