Items related to Red Joan
Inspired by the true story of Melita Norwood, a woman unmasked in 1999, at age 87, as the KGB's longest-serving British spy, Red Joan centers on the deeply conflicted life of a brilliant young physicist during the Second World War.
Talented and impressionable, Cambridge undergraduate Joan Stanley befriends the worldly Sonya, whose daring history is at odds with Joan's provincial upbringing. Joan also feels a growing attraction toward Leo, Sonya's mysterious and charismatic cousin. Sonya and Leo, known communist sympathizers with ties to Russia and Germany, interpret wartime loyalty in ways Joan can only begin to fathom.
As nations throughout the continent fall to fascism, Joan is enlisted into an urgent project that will change the course of the war—and the world—forever. Risking both career and conscience, leaking information to the Soviets, but struggling to maintain her own semblance of morality, Joan is caught at a crossroads in which all paths lead to the same end-game: the deployment of the atomic bomb.
Life during wartime, however, is often ambiguous, and when—decades later—MI5 agents appear at her doorstep, Joan must reaffirm the cost of the choices she made and face the cold truth: our deepest secrets have a way of dragging down those we love the most.
Talented and impressionable, Cambridge undergraduate Joan Stanley befriends the worldly Sonya, whose daring history is at odds with Joan's provincial upbringing. Joan also feels a growing attraction toward Leo, Sonya's mysterious and charismatic cousin. Sonya and Leo, known communist sympathizers with ties to Russia and Germany, interpret wartime loyalty in ways Joan can only begin to fathom.
As nations throughout the continent fall to fascism, Joan is enlisted into an urgent project that will change the course of the war—and the world—forever. Risking both career and conscience, leaking information to the Soviets, but struggling to maintain her own semblance of morality, Joan is caught at a crossroads in which all paths lead to the same end-game: the deployment of the atomic bomb.
Life during wartime, however, is often ambiguous, and when—decades later—MI5 agents appear at her doorstep, Joan must reaffirm the cost of the choices she made and face the cold truth: our deepest secrets have a way of dragging down those we love the most.
"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
About the Author:
Jennie Rooney was born in Liverpool in 1980. She studied history at the University of Cambridge and taught English in France before moving to London to work as an attorney. Her first novel, Inside the Whale, was shortlisted for the Costa First Novel Award.
Review:
Praise for Red Joan
"A brilliant spy novel, with a deft, involving plot... tense, beautifully pitched and very moving."
—Marie Claire
"A page-turning saga of spies, conflicted loyalty, and the grave consequences of good intentions."
—Publishers Weekly
"Rooney has created a wonderful narrative structure [that] elegantly presents a woman who was living a 'calm and contented existence' when MI5 came knocking on her door."
—Kirkus
"Rooney wonderfully evokes not only the political consciousness of the time but also the exhilaration — and the terror — of being young and risking everything...A drama of love, idealism, and betrayal that is as moving as it is thrilling."
—Barnes & Noble Review
"Rooney's re-creation of the politics of the day is brilliant."
—The Times
"Red Joan's strength lies in the complex personal relationships that underpin the spying game... A powerfully written exploration of the far-reaching consequences that even the smallest-seeming actions can have."
—Literary Review
"This is an infectious page-turner, as crafty and nuanced and impassioned as any classic thriller, but one that doesn't forget where its heart is."
—The National
"A sensitive spy thriller, finely detailed and resolutley sensitive. This excellent period novel still carries some considerable resonance in the age of Bradley Manning."
—Metro
"Rooney is a novelist at home with life's ambiguities, her plotting pleasingly intricate, her narrative richly textured."
—The Telegraph
"A brilliant spy novel, with a deft, involving plot... tense, beautifully pitched and very moving."
—Marie Claire
"A page-turning saga of spies, conflicted loyalty, and the grave consequences of good intentions."
—Publishers Weekly
"Rooney has created a wonderful narrative structure [that] elegantly presents a woman who was living a 'calm and contented existence' when MI5 came knocking on her door."
—Kirkus
"Rooney wonderfully evokes not only the political consciousness of the time but also the exhilaration — and the terror — of being young and risking everything...A drama of love, idealism, and betrayal that is as moving as it is thrilling."
—Barnes & Noble Review
"Rooney's re-creation of the politics of the day is brilliant."
—The Times
"Red Joan's strength lies in the complex personal relationships that underpin the spying game... A powerfully written exploration of the far-reaching consequences that even the smallest-seeming actions can have."
—Literary Review
"This is an infectious page-turner, as crafty and nuanced and impassioned as any classic thriller, but one that doesn't forget where its heart is."
—The National
"A sensitive spy thriller, finely detailed and resolutley sensitive. This excellent period novel still carries some considerable resonance in the age of Bradley Manning."
—Metro
"Rooney is a novelist at home with life's ambiguities, her plotting pleasingly intricate, her narrative richly textured."
—The Telegraph
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.
- PublisherVintage Digital
- Publication date2013
- ISBN 10 0701187573
- ISBN 13 9780701187576
- BindingHardcover
- Number of pages392
- Rating
Buy New
Learn more about this copy
US$ 14.50
Shipping:
US$ 23.00
From New Zealand to U.S.A.
Other Popular Editions of the Same Title
Top Search Results from the AbeBooks Marketplace
Stock Image
Red Joan
Published by
Chatto & Windus, London
(2013)
ISBN 10: 0701187573
ISBN 13: 9780701187576
New
Hardcover
First Edition
Quantity: 1
Seller:
Rating
Book Description Hardcover. Condition: New. Dust Jacket Condition: New. 1st Edition. New and unread first printing. Joan's voice is almost a whisper. Nobody talked about what they did during the war. We all knew we weren't allowed to. Joan Stanley has a secret. She is a loving mother, a doting grandmother, and leads a quiet, unremarkable life in the suburbs. Then one morning there is a knock on the door, and suddenly the past she has been so keen to hide for the last fifty years threatens to overturn her comfortable world. Cambridge University in 1937 is awash with ideas and idealists, yet unworldly Joan feels better suited to a science lecture and a cup of cocoa. But a chance meeting with the glamorous Russian-born Sonya and her charismatic cousin Leo blurs the edges of the things Joan thought she knew about the world, and about herself. In the post-War world of smoke and mirrors, allegiance is a slippery thing. Working in a government ministry with access to top-secret information, Joan is suddenly faced with the most difficult question of all- what price would you pay to remain true to what you believe? Would you betray your country, your family, even the man you love?. Seller Inventory # 036101
Buy New
US$ 14.50
Convert currency
Stock Image
Red Joan
Published by
Vintage Digital
(2013)
ISBN 10: 0701187573
ISBN 13: 9780701187576
New
Hardcover
Quantity: 1
Seller:
Rating
Book Description Hardcover. Condition: new. New. Fast Shipping and good customer service. Seller Inventory # Holz_New_0701187573
Buy New
US$ 51.98
Convert currency
Stock Image
Red Joan
Published by
Vintage Digital
(2013)
ISBN 10: 0701187573
ISBN 13: 9780701187576
New
Hardcover
Quantity: 1
Seller:
Rating
Book Description Hardcover. Condition: new. New. Seller Inventory # Wizard0701187573
Buy New
US$ 54.31
Convert currency
Stock Image
Red Joan
Published by
Vintage Digital
(2013)
ISBN 10: 0701187573
ISBN 13: 9780701187576
New
Hardcover
Quantity: 1
Seller:
Rating
Book Description Hardcover. Condition: new. New Copy. Customer Service Guaranteed. Seller Inventory # think0701187573
Buy New
US$ 53.78
Convert currency