The Rose Code

Author : Kate Quinn

Genre : Historical Fiction

This is a complex story about three women, who in 1940, as England prepares to fight the Nazis, answer the call to the country estate Bletchley Park, where the best minds in Britain train to break German military codes. Osla, the girl who has everything—beauty, wealth, and Prince Philip of Greece as a boyfriend, puts her fluent German to use as a translator of decoded enemy secrets. Self-made Mab of east-end London poverty, works the legendary codebreaking machines and is looking for a socially advantageous husband. While rooming in Beth Finch’s home, both Osla and Mab see Beth’s potential, whose shyness conceals a brilliant facility with puzzles. Soon Beth becomes one of the Park’s few female cryptanalysts. But war, loss, and the impossible pressure of secrecy will tear the three apart.

As the royal wedding of Princess Elizabeth and Prince Philip is happening in 1947, the three friends-turned-enemies are reunited by an encrypted letter. A mysterious traitor has emerged from the shadows of their Bletchley Park past, and now Osla, Mab, and Beth must resurrect their old alliance and crack one last code together.

This well-crafted and sometimes raw historical fiction has it all—intrigue, secrets, sorrow, abuse, love, forgiveness, and  the most unlikely friendships.