{"id":2268,"date":"2017-05-26T13:12:43","date_gmt":"2017-05-26T20:12:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/?p=2268"},"modified":"2017-05-26T13:12:43","modified_gmt":"2017-05-26T20:12:43","slug":"james-r-benn-billy-boyle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/james-r-benn-billy-boyle\/","title":{"rendered":"James R. Benn: Billy Boyle"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"We sell a TON of James R. Benn titles, often this first one, Billy Boyle<\/em>. Billy is an Irish cop circa 1942, when he\u2019s drafted. His uncles, who lived through WWI, don\u2019t like the idea of Billy going overseas so they pull some strings, getting him assigned to a \u201ccushy\u201d desk job with cousin Ike (a.k.a. Eisenhower). While I usually dislike historical novels featuring real people, cousin Ike (other than getting Billy over to England) only plays a small part in the story, so I was OK with it.<\/p>\n

Billy, fresh from the states, is unsure what to expect. He\u2019s put up at the Dorchester hotel (in an attic room, obviously previously used for servants) and is quickly introduced to the people he\u2019ll be working with. Among them are the glamorous Daphne, a WREN far more capable than her assignments, and a courtly and melancholy Polish Baron named Kaz who has lost his family to the Nazis.<\/p>\n

As Billy arrives, the Allies are set to launch Operation Jupiter \u2013 basically a plan to get the Nazis out of Norway \u2013 when there\u2019s an unexpected suicide, which of course turns out to be murder.<\/p>\n

Benn capably sets up a locked room mystery situation \u2013 the murder could only have been committed by someone at the Dorchester, which is filled with Norwegian officers. Daphne comes up with a plan to get Billy (and herself) where she needs to go, and she, Kaz and Billy set off to far flung parts of Britain in their quest to uncover a killer. On the way they stop at Daphne\u2019s home, a lovely country estate, where Billy is more than smitten with Daphne\u2019s sister, Diana.<\/p>\n

The trio splits up to do their investigating, Billy heading out to speak with one of the Norwegians getting ready to go overseas to take part in the secret operation to liberate Norway from the Nazis. When Billy returns to meet up with Daphne and Kaz there\u2019s a death so jaw dropping that finishing the novel gains even more urgency. Billy, a rookie cop back home, has been elevated to playing a real detective and he\u2019s finding it challenging but, with his Dad\u2019s voice in his head advising him on what to do, he perseveres and discovers the culprit.<\/p>\n

A secret operation of Billy\u2019s own puts paid to the murderer, but he\u2019s plagued with the idea that his actions have cost lives. Benn is really expert in highlighting these wartime dilemmas, of which that last is the largest: how to balance the greater good with the cost of some (or many) lives figuring into the equation (I was reminded of the excellent movie about Alan Turing, The Imitation Game, <\/em>which takes the same thing into account. Benn\u2019s book predates the film by several years).<\/p>\n

Benn is a lively storyteller, nicely balancing character, a dash of romance, a well drawn wartime setting and a terrific plot. This is thankfully already a lengthy series, and I can\u2019t recommend starting with this novel more highly.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We sell a TON of James R. Benn titles, often this first one, Billy Boyle. Billy is an Irish cop circa 1942, when he\u2019s drafted. His uncles, who lived through WWI, don\u2019t like the idea of Billy going overseas so they pull some strings, getting him assigned to a \u201ccushy\u201d desk job with cousin Ike … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[10],"class_list":["post-2268","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-historical"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2268","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2268"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2268\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2270,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2268\/revisions\/2270"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2268"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2268"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2268"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}