Book Review: Code Name: Lise: The True Story of the Woman Who Became WWII’s Most Highly Decorated Spy by Larry Loftis

About:

Code Name: Lise: The True Story of the Woman Who Became WWII’s Most Highly Decorated Spy by Larry Loftis is a non-fiction book about a British spy operating in occupied France. Mr. Lofits was a corporate attorney, but is now a full time writer.

• 384 pages
• Publisher: Gallery Books
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1501198653

My rating for Lise: The True Story of the Woman Who Became WWII’s Most Highly Decorated Spy – 5
Buy Lise: The True Story of the Woman Who Became WWII’s Most Highly Decorated Spy from Amazon.com*
More Books by Larry Loftis*

 

Thoughts:

The one thing which I immediately realized by reading this book is that the author has much sympathy for his subject. Odette Sansom, Lise, was not just the most decorated woman, but the most decorated woman of the whole war.

Code Name: Lise: The True Story of the Woman Who Became WWII’s Most Highly Decorated Spy by Larry Loftis tells an amazing story, and it’s one of those book which I love, the author taking a real story and writing it as if it were a novel. Mr. Loftis creates a nerve wrecking narrative, filled with excitement and heroism. I found the writing to be a bit cliché at times, which was odd since the story is anything but.

When people call about “having a calling” they should read this book, Mrs. Sansom left her daughters in a convent to go to what essentially was “spy school”, because she simply had to do something to help during the war. She learned to be proficient with many weapons, the difference in uniforms of the Axis armies, as well as master her new identity.

The author describes in detail Mrs. Sansom / Lise’s mission and ordeal while being captured. She spent many months being tortured and thinking she will be executed, all being told to the reader in somewhat grisly detail. In a game of lies, two big ones saved her, she pretended to be the wife of her commander, Peter Churchill, who pretended to be related to the famous prime minister, The Hero of the Empire.
Peter wasn’t related, but he and Odette got married after the war.

This book is a fast read and the narrative is thrilling and intense. This is an amazing story, I understand that Odette Sansom is famous in England, and I’m glad her story is being told across the pond.

Buy Lise: The True Story of the Woman Who Became WWII’s Most Highly Decorated Spy from Amazon.com*
More Books by Larry Loftis*

Zohar — Man of la Book
Dis­claimer: I got this book for free.
*Ama­zon links point to an affil­i­ate account