Code name Verity by Elizabeth Wein

In 1943, a British fighter plane crashes in Nazi-occupied France and the survivor tells a tale of friendship, war, espionage, and great courage as she relates what she must to survive while keeping secret all that she can.

Even by the point that I wasn't feeling female spies in the world wars any more, I still really enjoyed this. What stuck with me were the strong and nuanced female characters and their deep friendship.

Full review at SFF Book Review.

This came highly recommended from all corners of the internet.
As superb as the writing and the story were, I seem to be the only person who didn't feel the friendship between Maddie and “Verity” as strongly. This would have been a perfect book if there had been more time to establish the strong bond between the protagonists.

Having the bad out of the way, let me tell you why you should absolutely read it anyway. It is a wonderful story about a female pilot during World War II and a female spy. They are best friends and show us the war through their eyes. It is suspenseful, it is tragic (as war stories tend to be), and it has moments of sheer brilliance.

It wasn't perfect, but still an excellent read.

8/10

I'm glad I have finally read this, but it was not the book for me. I was definitely more interested in Maddie's story over Verity's, but I really did not connect with the story or the characters.