The Starlet Spy book review

In 1943, the entire world is embroiled in war, and Amelie Blake feels like she’s not doing her part for the war effort. Hollywood cast her as a witless damsel, but she longs to use the intellect that God gave her. She gets more than she expected when a producer offers her a leading role in recovering missing atmoic research. The only caveat–the research is lost somewhere in her home country, Sweden.

Despite its neutrality, Sweden is locked behind the Nazi curtain, and Amelie hasn’t been able to get home to visit her mother since the beginning of the war. She can’t imagine any story where the world would believe she’s an innocent actress if she suddenly turned up at her home. Unfortunately, her cover is that her only family–her mother–is near death. Even when she’s assured that her mother isn’t really ill, she readily returns to Sweden to see for herself.

Everything about the premise of this book grabbed my interest. What would it be like to be a star in Hollywood, yet only desire to see my mother? What if I was offered a covert mission that would give me my one wish? Would I be brave enough to travel from California, across the whole of the USA, traverse the Atlantic ocean, slip through an enemy’s fierce air force, and present myself to country-wide fans all to track down secret documents that could get me killed? During this era, so many minimally trained, every day people did things just like this. The Starlet Spy is a tribute to them.

What is the genre for The Starlet Spy?

So much of this story revolves around a spy’s duty to locate and extract missing atmoic research, but there’s also a main romantic thread. It wasn’t as pronounced as I feared it might be with a beautiful Hollywood actress as the main character. And I enjoyed really how Rachel Scott McDaniel used this bit of personality in final scene.

Was there inappropriate content in The Starlet Spy?

Amelie does carry a revolver strapped to her thigh, and this gets referenced many times throughout the story. She also mentally runs through many fears that women can face in a dangerous situation. None of these events occur though, and it’s a clean story even with the hints at some of these situations. I was surprised. Too many stories these days feel the need to go into great detail, but this one refrained.

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