Three Hours In Paris

First things, first: this book is not part of the authors very successful mystery series featuring Aimee LeDuc. However, it is a first rate thriller set in Paris during WWII. The mission is perilous, the assassin is very likable, and the action is non-stop. Our assassin is an American working for the British secret service after her husband and daughter were killed. She is a skilled shot after growing up on a ranch in Oregon. She knows Paris and French because she studied at the Sorbonne before war broke out. She is smart, resourceful, and resilient. The writing is excellent. You feel the tension, the exhaustion, the terror, and the constant mental reevaluation. Our heroine does not know who to trust and neither does the reader. Both sides are ruthless. Nothing feels contrived or implausible. The pacing is fast. There is torture and violence, but nothing on the page is overly gruesome . I read this during our shelter at home time, and it successfully distracted me from thinking about COVID 19. WWII secrets have often been a factor in the Aimee LeDuc mysteries which are set in the 1970s. This book has a more hard-boiled feel than the mysteries, which is appropriate to the story being told.

Overly complicated and boring. Cardboard characters moving through a maze. And the major premise of the plot, why she was sent on her mission, was so morally wrong. Sure its fiction, but come on, really? Ive enjoyed Cara Black’s other novels, so Im disappointed. 40% in and couldnt even finish it. Wish I could get my money back.

Until I read Three Hours in Paris, my favorite Cara Black book was Murder in the Marais. This takes its place. While it does not have the sometimes lighthearted air of Aimee Leduc, it also does without the gruesome scenes often found in espionage novels. Kate Rees suffers a tragedy in the early days of World War II. This leaves her in a depressed state, vulnerable to an offer from British intelligence to get even with the Nazis by working as a sniper in Paris. I cant give much more detail without creating spoilers, but she encounters more than she bargained for and learns not to trust anyone, not even the people she works for. There are many plot twists, and Kate begins to wonder what the real reason was she was sent to France and if she will ever get out. It is hard to put down.

I love Cara Blacks Aimee Leduc novels, but feel she may have stepped outside her comfort zone with THREE HOURS IN PARIS. Its the story of Kate, a young American whose husband and baby are killed in a Luftwaffe bombing. Eager for revenge, shes recruited by a shadowy British intelligence group to shoot Hitler during a visit to Paris. Hitler escapes, obviously, and Kate is pursued by a smart German military officer in what could have become a fascinating game of cat and mouse.

If youre not familiar with this era, you may find THREE HOURS both entertaining and informative. However, a lack of subtlety and depth in the characters and setting made it hard for me to believe in Kate as a person of her time (early 1940s). Instead, she seemed more like an actress in a modern movie. In early wartime Britain and France, I believe most educated women of her age would have been more mature and knowledgeable about current events, and less emotion-driven than she appeared to be. The past is said to be a different country, but in this novel it didnt feel quite different enough to me.

A departure from Cara Black’s mystery series, this spy thriller does not feature the glamorous Aime Leduc, but a hard scrabble heroine raised on ranches in the American West, Kate Rees, codename Cowgirl, on a mission to assassinate Adolf Hitler for British Intelligence. No Herms scarves for this Cowgirl, a formidable heroine and skilled markswoman who creates her own luck, hiding in the filthy nooks and crannies of Nazi-occupied Paris during sweltering summer days of 1940.

Drawing on her intimate knowledge of Paris and its history, Black moves us through its byways in a fast-paced thriller as Kate seeks to outrun her predator, a brilliant German detective. But nothing is as it seems. Faced with challenges and betrayal, Kate, who once thought she had no reason to live, discovers her instinct to stay alive against all odds. A strangely appropriate read during this time of COVID-19, “Three Hours in Paris” is stimulating and encouraging. Black’s heroine is a superb role model in a hostile world, closing in on all sides. I finished the book feeling invigorated and dauntlessyou will, too. Brava Cara Black!

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