Review: The Mozart Code

I had quite enjoyed Rachel McMillan’s The London Restoration when I read it last year (review here) so was looking forward to The Mozart Code, which was published earlier this month. I really liked the historical aspect of the novel and the tense storyline kept me reading.

Here’s the book’s description:

Lady Sophia Huntington Villiers is no stranger to intrigue, as her work with Alan Turing’s Bombe Machines at Bletchley Park during the war attests. Now, as part of Simon Barre’s covert team in post-war Vienna, she uses her inimitable charm and code name Starling to infiltrate the world of relics: uncovering vital information that could tilt the stakes of the mounting Cold War. When several influential men charge her with finding the death mask of Mozart, Sophie wonders if there is more than the composer’s legacy at stake and finds herself drawn to potential answers in Prague.
Simon Barrington, the illegitimate heir of one of Sussex’s oldest estates, used the previous war to hide his insecurities about his past. Now, he uses his high breeding to gain access to all four allied quarters of the ruined city in an attempt to slow the fall of the Iron Curtain. He has been in love with Sophie Villiers since the moment he met her, and a marriage of convenience to save Simon’s estate has always kept her close. Until now, when Sophie’s mysterious client in Prague forces him to wonder if her allegiance to him—and their cause—is in question. Torn between his loyalty to his cause and his heart, Simon seeks answers about Sophie only to learn that everything he thought he knew about his involvement in both wars is based on a lie.

The post-World War II world is quite fascinating. A new kind of war is on its way when millions of people are still trying to recover from the last one. It’s a different type of war, though, one that people like Simon can excel at. He’s extremely intelligent and uses his brain and upbringing to help uncover spy rings and stay many steps ahead of the people he’s hunting. Simon also used that intelligence during WWII and worked at Bletchley Park but, at the time of the war, no one knew what was happening there and many people would have assumed the men not off fighting in the “real” battles were cowards and not doing their part. It took years for details to come out and I have a feeling we’ll never really know what happened in places like Bletchley – the Official Secrets Act was a powerful thing.

Unfortunately, I had a few problems with this story. Brent and Diana, from The London Restoration, were in this novel but they didn’t really have a good reason for being included. If you had picked up The Mozart Code without reading the companion novel, you’d wonder what on earth this couple was doing there and why they were so important to Simon and Sophie. I mean, I did read their book and I still couldn’t recall the exact relationships between the four and why they were all together. Like with the other book, the flashbacks didn’t always work for me, nor did the hints about the characters’ past. Sophie briefly worked for the Special Operations Executive and it was hinted at but by the time more details were revealed, I didn’t really care anymore and didn’t really see why it mattered. And their work at Bletchley Park was referenced often but not enough for me to know why I needed to know the small pieces of info McMillan was telling me. It was just like I was missing A LOT of information and details and the characters suffered because of it.

Even though I had a few issues, the action in this story was pretty addictive. I was on the edge of my seat and I didn’t know how all the characters were going to make it through unscathed. It reminded me of how I felt while reading The Rose Code by Kate Quinn. The spying, the intrigue, the mystery! I was into it.

I liked that McMillan brought up how difficult it was to adjust to the new normal and how some people, like Simon and Sophie, wished the war was still going on. Not literally, of course, they’re not monsters. But there was a purpose to doing war work which was especially potent for women. After years of doing their bit, people were expected to get back to normal. I can’t imagine what that would have been like. (Actually, maybe we can imagine it after the last two years we’ve had…) I don’t blame Sophie for wishing something more was happening because I would have hated to have been working for a purpose for years and then all of a sudden be unable to simply because I’m a woman and the men were back and I was no longer needed.

Read The Mozart Code for the mystery and intrigue and riveting historical details. Rachel McMillan is a talented writer and I’ll still be checking out what she writes next, even if I had a few issues with her latest.

*An egalley of this novel was provided by the publisher, Thomas Nelson, via NetGalley in exchange for review consideration. All opinions are honest and my own.*

Review: The London Restoration

You'd think at some point I'd get tired of World War II set historical fiction. I certainly won't run out of it since it seems like there's a new release (or two) every week. I have not yet reached that point. I probably won't ever reach that point, to be honest. The latest WWII set novel I read was Rachel McMillan's The London Restoration and it kept me intrigued from the first page to the last. 

Here's the book's description:

London, Fall 1945. Architectural historian Diana Somerville's experience as a codebreaker at Bletchley Park and her knowledge of London's churches intersect in MI6's pursuit of a Russian agent named Eternity. Diana wants nothing more than to begin again with her husband Brent after their separation during the war, but her signing of the Official Secrets Act keeps him at a distance.

Brent Somerville, professor of theology at King's College, hopes aiding his wife with her church consultations will help him better understand why she disappeared when he needed her most. But he must find a way to reconcile his traumatic experiences as a stretcher bearer on the European front with her obvious lies about her wartime activities and whereabouts.

Technically, the majority of the novel takes place after VE Day (Victory in Europe Day when the war was declared over in Europe on May 8, 1945) but there are flashbacks so the reader knows how Diana and Brent spent their wars. The novel was a reminder that things didn't just automatically go back to normal as soon as the war was over. Rationing continued for almost another decade and it took a long time for bombed buildings to be rebuilt. Reading as Diana and Brent visited the remains of some of the churches in London was sobering. I'm not a religious person but I appreciate beautiful buildings and can't imagine how difficult it would have been for communities to lose their houses of worship (on top of their actual houses) because of German bombings. 

While I think it was important to have some of the information about what Diana and Brent were going through during the war I found the flashbacks sometimes took me totally out of the story. I wanted to hear about their experiences but something about the way the scenes were written didn't quite work for me.

Brent is suffering from what we now know as PTSD and he and Diana are trying to find their way back to each other and figure out what their marriage is going to look like now. McMillan wrote the emotions they were both feeling really well and I was anxious for the pair to make it through. It was nice to read about an already established couple (even though they hadn't actually spent more than a day at a time together since they were married) as they were sorting through this new post-war world. I could tell they had a really solid foundation and I hoped that would be enough.

I hadn't known much, if anything, about traitors at Bletchley Park or the start of the Cold War until I read Kate Quinn's The Rose Code recently (review here). So, to see it also come up in this novel was quite interesting. It was another thing that indicated the war wasn't as over as it may seem or, perhaps more appropriately, it had bred another kind of war. The history and the intrigue from hunting spies were compelling and I definitely did not guess who was behind Eternity before it was revealed.

I'm really glad I finally made time to read The London Restoration. Rachel McMillan's novel was one I really wanted to get to in 2020 (it was released in August) but I just couldn't fit it into the reading schedule. It's an interesting read for historical fiction fans and I'm looking forward to The Mozart Code, which features some of the characters from this novel and is set to be published in September 2021.

*An egalley of this novel was provided by the publisher, HarperCollins Canada, in exchange for review consideration. All opinions are honest and my own.*