Stock Photo: Cover May Be Different
Transcription
by Atkinson, Kate
- Used
- Hardcover
- Condition
- See description
- ISBN 10
- 0385691521
- ISBN 13
- 9780385691529
- Seller
-
Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada
Payment Methods Accepted
About This Item
Toronto: Bond Street Books, 2018. Hardcover. pp. 336. 8vo. Light general shelfwear, creasing to p. 107; very good in very good dustjacket.
Reviews
On Oct 25 2018, a reader said:
Transcription is the fourth stand-alone novel by award-winning British author, Kate Atkinson. In 1940, eighteen-year-old Juliet Armstrong finds herself recruited into the Secret Service. Mostly it's fairly boring, typing up reports and transcribing recordings of agents meeting with British Nazi-sympathisers. But then she's given another identity and the work gets more interesting, for a while. After one exciting episode, arrests are made.
But there were some incidents about which Juliet doesn't like to think too much, and when the war ends, she's not sorry to leave it all behind. Five years later, Juliet is working for the BBC producing children's programs when a face from the past appears: the man who posed as the Gestapo contact passes her in the street. What is disconcerting is that he pretends not to know her.
On the heels of this, a somewhat threatening note is delivered, more of her former colleagues from MI5 flit in and out, and she feels sure she is being followed. Frustrated for information from official channels, Juliet decides to become the hunter rather than the prey.
Once again, Atkinson gives the reader a plot that is perfectly plausible, but filled with twists and red herrings. Her depiction of London during the war and in the immediate aftermath has an authentic feel, with the social attitudes portrayed appropriate for the era. Her protagonist is easily believable: Juliet is intelligent but still naïve, although perhaps not quite as innocent as she first seems.
Her descriptive prose is excellent, as always, and Atkinson no doubt delighted in dropping this piece of dialogue in the final pages: "Fisher clapped his hands, as if to signal the end of the entertainment and said, 'Come now, quite enough of exposition and explanation. We're not approaching the end of a novel, Miss Armstrong.'" Another Atkinson masterpiece.
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Details
- Bookseller
- BISON BOOKS - ABAC/ILAB (CA)
- Bookseller's Inventory #
- 073207
- Title
- Transcription
- Author
- Atkinson, Kate
- Format/Binding
- Hardcover
- Book Condition
- Used
- Quantity Available
- 1
- ISBN 10
- 0385691521
- ISBN 13
- 9780385691529
- Publisher
- Bond Street Books
- Place of Publication
- Toronto
- Date Published
- 2018
- Keywords
- English Ficiton; MI5; Espionage; BBC; Mystery
Terms of Sale
BISON BOOKS - ABAC/ILAB
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About the Seller
BISON BOOKS - ABAC/ILAB
Biblio member since 2003
Winnipeg, Manitoba
About BISON BOOKS - ABAC/ILAB
Bison Books is a welcoming and sunny open shop in the heart of downtown Winnipeg, and we maintain a meticulously-curated eclectic selection of about 20,000 antiquarian and secondhand books.
Glossary
Some terminology that may be used in this description includes:
- Shelfwear
- Minor wear resulting from a book being place on, and taken from a bookshelf, especially along the bottom edge.