THE SOLDIER SPIES

First hardcover printing of the third volume of the Men at War trilogy, begun with The Last Heroes (1997) and The Secret Warriors (1999), both rousingly well received reprints of softcover originals published under the pseudonym Alex Baldwin. The Last Heroes tells of Wild Bill Donovan’s newly formed Office of Strategic Services (OSS) and how it learns about uranium ore in the Belgian Congo, vital to building the atomic bomb. In The Secret Warriors, the OSS has to drop agents into the Belgian Congo and smuggle out ore while avoiding German agents. Now, Donovan gets more involved with General Leslie Groves’s supervision of building the A-bomb while simultaneously fighting off rival intelligence chiefs who don—t need to know about the bomb. Meantime, Donovan’s agents in Morocco, led by Second Lieutenant Eric Fulmar, are after two leading defectors; and meanwhile in England, Major Richard Canidy prepares to suck the secrets of the incredible new jet engine, as well as of the V-2 rocket bomb, out of Germany. Also on hand is a fated pilot, Lt. Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr. Since this episode ends in January 1943, there may be still further adventures with the OSS. In any event—despite vast detail and readers” likely familiarity with the OSS—Griffin’s plot stays hot and moves at quicksilver speed.