“Princess Elizabeth’s Spy” - Susan Elia MacNeal

 🏰 If you especially enjoyed the early seasons of “The Crown” - I think you’ll enjoy this novel as it takes mathematician-turned-secret agent, Maggie Hope, straight into some WWII-era intrigue at Windsor Castle. The story opens on Wallis and Edward plotting (need I say more?), before taking us to Windsor Castle where Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret have been evacuated. This novel was fast, fun, and riveting in places. It was dripping with historical detail, which I loved. The WWII Windsor Castle setting with a young Princess Elizabeth, was great fun.

🏰 The scenes on the grounds of Windsor Castle were my favorite parts of this book. It is clear that MacNeal has carefully researched the WWII-era furnishings, the layout of the castle, as well as castle etiquette. PES was rich with historical detail and I love that aspect of MacNeal’s writing. 

MacNeal relied upon the (non-scandalous per Sally Bedell Smith) tell-all penned by Crawfie that resulted in her banishment from Queen Elizabeth’s inner circle, as well as Smith’s biography of Queen Elizabeth. Crawfie and Alah are substantial presences in PES, and we glean many details of the young princesses’ lives during their evacuation at Windsor Castle.

🏰 I appreciated MacNeal’s increased attention to David in this book. It provided perspective on the trauma endured by LGTBQ+ people trapped between being true to themselves while maintaining a public facade. It served as a side plot, but also informed the reader about the times.

🏰 However, I did have some quibbles. The first of which, is that Maggie was harder to sympathize with this time. Her impetuous decisions in book 1 are excusable as she was working as a typist. But in book 2, she is fully an MI-5 agent yet she displays the same petulant attitude as before. She is shown to have gone through training and signed up for this high-level mission, but she does not seem to have matured at all. She is grating in her constant surprise that 100% of the facts have not been carefully laid out for her by her superiors. 

🚨 🚨 🚨 [SPOILERS AHEAD] 🚨 🚨 🚨 

🏰 Maggie is sent by MI5 to Windsor Castle to protect Princess Elizabeth. As a sleuth, she fails roundly. She doesn’t put together the big picture because she is blinded by her own assumptions and biases. Maggie does not prevent the kidnapping of Princess Elizabeth; she does damage control with her scrappy quick-thinking, with time and luck on her side.

🏰 Maggie fails in her mission to avert the kidnapping plot, but she succeeds in keeping the Princess safe through sheer nerve and luck. But this suggests to me that Maggie isn’t cut out for this sort of work. I can only assume that Frain pulled Hugh from the case because he was astute and realized he had two lovesick agents on his hands. Much as we don’t like Nievens, there’s no escaping the fact that Maggie acted against direct orders to report to him.  

🏰 The third book in this series sends Maggie behind enemy lines. Let that sink in for a moment. After nearly botching the job in PES, and ignoring direct orders, Churchill and MI5 want to send this loose canon to Berlin?!  Remember, at the beginning of PES, Maggie has failed out of Camp Spook. Add to that the twisted circumstances of her family (which are set up at the end of this book), and I just don’t think I can stomach it.

🏰 Beyond the lack of maturity in Maggie’s character after book 1, there were a few other plot points that stuck out to me. 

1. Frain does not provide Maggie with detailed maps of Windsor Castle? I’m no spymaster, but it seems totally ridiculous that she has to rely on dubious insiders to gain a lay of the land. He also does not brief her on palace etiquette and dress codes. Don’t you want your secret agent to remain … secret?
2. Alistair Tooke’s personal vendetta against Lily is never explained. Perhaps he knew something and was justifiably angry that his wife was falsley accused, but the reader is never informed of any motive to gruesomely murder Lily.
3. Louisa as a red herring could have been developed to greater climactic advantage. It seemed like MacNeal abruptly dropped this promising thread.
4. The climax on the U-boat, while certainly high-octane, had me puzzled. With such a valuable hostage onboard, why weren’t they shot dead when the U-boat is on the verge of capture? If the entire basis of the plot was to create a succession crisis, I didn’t follow the inaction of the N*zis here. Obviously, keeping her as a hostage would be the first choice for both political and morale reasons, but failing that, creating a sense of panic by killing the heir, would seem to be the obvious move.