The Undercover Bookshop by Katherine Reay

 

My thoughts

This is a very well written story. Based on actual events. A real soviet spy. It intrigued me. 

This story started out so slow that I was initially afraid I was not going to finish it. I was afraid I would not like it at all. But somewhere along the way it started gaining speed and didn't slow down. It ended up being a very enjoyable read. In many places it had me holding my breath. 

Gemma is somewhat of a sleuth. She works at a small store where they just added a small bookstore. Gemma filled it with the mysteries that she loves to read. She didn't mean to do that so had to order more books that would keep the people in this small Cotswold village of Great Rollright interesting in buying. After she bombs baking a cake someone suggest she might seek baking lessons from the best baker in town. So she does...

Ursula Beurton is the town's best baker. She is not well liked or received in this small town though. When Gemma asks her about baking lessons they become fairly good friends. Despite the age difference. Ursula is older than Gemma. She has two children, a boy and a girl. Her husband is not around much since he broke his leg. Ursula has secrets. Lots of secrets.

Gemma is very good at catching people in lies. She finds herself a bit suspicious of Ursula. There are several things that are just not right. A tall antenna and a two way radio being among them. Gemma confides in her best friend and together they set out to find out what Ursula is hiding. Could Ursula be a spy?? Though most think her husband is Gemma believes it's Ursula herself. 

You find out everything in this story. All the secrets and who is who. It has a love story also. A nice love story between Gemma and PC Charles. There are people involved in things that cause Gemma's best friend to disappear and eventually even Gemma has to go away. You'll find out what happen to her, Ursula, and PC Charles. And what happened to Peggy. Eveything is answered. 

Read the Author's Note and ACknowledgments at the end. A lot of good info there. 

Thank you to NetGalley, Harper Muse, Katherine Reay and Uplit Reads for the arc. 

About

During the winter of 1950 in the small Cotswold village of Great Rollright, amateur sleuth Gemma Brown starts to suspect that the town’s best baker, Ursula Beurton, is a Soviet spy, tumbling her headlong into a dangerous game of cat-and-mouse that ends with a decision that will lead her to the Undercover Bookshop and change her life forever.

Recently moved to the English Cotswolds, Gemma Brown desperately wants to create the kind of idyllic life she’s read about in her favorite mystery novels, with herself as the leading lady. But fitting in proves difficult as Gemma is more adept at solving mysteries and setting up the village’s first bookstore than she is at baking cakes or grasping social niceties. Nevertheless, she finds a friend in Peggy, a young woman recently moved to town herself, and Ursula Beurton, who is not only the village’s best baker but an enigmatic figure who sparks controversy in the small-town gossip network.

As Gemma spends more time with Ursula, she begins to suspect all those novels are affecting her thinking. The oddities she starts to notice must be her imagination because, if not, they point to something far more dangerous than winning the local baking contest or being placed on the church committee. Could her neighbor be a real spy?

Following her instincts and a few skills learned through fiction, Gemma soon becomes embroiled in an international intrigue involving the village’s mysterious benefactor, Lady Marchmont, MI5, and the KGB. In an unexpected twist, however, Ursula asks Gemma for a favor which may endanger all their lives as their next chapter unfolds in Gemma’s new venture, the Undercover Bookshop.