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Title details for Half a Crown by Jo Walton - Available

Half a Crown

A Novel

#3 in series

by Jo Walton
ebook
1 of 1 copy available
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1 of 1 copy available
With "understated prose and deft characterizations" a Hugo and Nebula Award–winning author's imagines post-WWII England as a fascist regime (Publishers Weekly).
In 1941 the European war ended in the Farthing Peace, a rapprochement between Britain and Nazi Germany. The balls and banquets of Britain's upper class never faltered, while British ships ferried "undesirables" across the Channel to board the cattle cars headed east.
Peter Carmichael is commander of the Watch, Britain's distinctly British secret police. It's his job to warn the Prime Minister of treason, to arrest plotters, and to discover Jews. The midnight knock of a Watchman is the most dreaded sound in the realm.
Now, in 1960, a global peace conference is convening in London, where Britain, Germany, and Japan will oversee the final partition of the world. Hitler is once again on British soil. So is the long exiled Duke of Windsor—and the rising gangs of "British Power" streetfighters, who consider the Government "soft," may be the former king's bid to stage a coup d'état.
Amidst all this, two of the most unlikely persons in the realm will join forces to oppose the fascists: a debutante whose greatest worry until now has been where to find the right string of pearls, and the Watch Commander himself.

  • Creators

  • Series

    Small Change

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    May 1, 2024

  • Formats

    • Kindle Book

    • OverDrive Read

      • ISBN: 9781429954631

    • EPUB ebook

      • ISBN: 9781429954631
      • File size: 2526 KB

    • Open EPUB ebook

      • ISBN: 9781429954631
      • File size: 1977 KB

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • Publisher's Weekly

      August 4, 2008
      In Walton’s fine conclusion to her alternative-history trilogy (after Ha’penny
      ), former Scotland Yarder Peter Carmichael, now head of the secret police organization known as the Watch, must prepare for a peace conference to be held in London two decades after Britain reached an accommodation with Hitler’s Germany in the early 1940s. Carmichael also has to worry about his sexual relationship with his valet, Jack, and the covert unit within the Watch he’s created to smuggle British Jews out of the country. Then his naïve 18-year-old ward, Elvira Royston, who’s about to be presented to the queen, overhears a conversation that could compromise her protector. Elvira, who winds up in police custody after attending a political rally that turns violent, accepts her authoritarian society with a casualness that’s truly chilling. Walton’s understated prose and deft characterizations elevate this above similar works such as Fatherland
      and SS-GB
      . Some readers, though, may feel let down by an optimistic ending that jars with the series’ overall downbeat tone.

Formats

  • Kindle Book
  • OverDrive Read
  • EPUB ebook
  • Open EPUB ebook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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