That Summer in Berlin

Cornwall (The Woman at the Front) delivers a serviceable tale of intrigue during the 1936 Olympics. Viviane Alden is a spirited English lady with a camera and guts, and her leading man is gruff Tom Graham, a Scottish earl’s illegitimate son. Tom, a journalist, shares Viviane’s determination to find proof during the festivities that Germany is preparing for another war. Though Viviane is purportedly in Berlin to chaperone her debutante stepsister, who’s searching like many women of their generation for a German husband as part of Britain’s diplomacy effort, she earns Tom’s trust by sharing the story of her soldier father’s death from German mustard gas. Still, as Tom gets in deeper undercover with the Germans, he worries she might betray him, his thoughts confronting him with a “bottomless pool of intrigue and suspicion.” Just about everything here is predictable, but Cornwall does a good job making Viviane a classic heroine, capable of saving herself while still appreciating being saved, and of proving that women can work just as well as men. There’s nothing remarkable here, but it’s enjoyable nonetheless. Agent: Kevan Lyon, Marsal Lyon Literary Agency. (Oct.)