If you like your mysteries with a strong dose of romantic interest, then Weaver’s latest in her Electra McDonnell series will please you mightily. It certainly did this reader.

The usual cast returned, to my satisfaction: Electra “Ellie” and her Uncle Mick, petty criminals until recruited by British Intelligence and the aristocratic Major Ramsay, the usual villainous suspects, in this case German spies and collaborators, and a few new intelligence heroes to add to the Major’s team. We also once again meet Felix, master forgerer, and Ellie’s best friend and possibly something MOAR, except foiled because we finally FINALLY have an acknowledgement of feelings on Ellie’s and the Major’s part. Things end up in an emotionally thornier place than ever, but I’ll take it. For the deets, the publisher’s blurb will suffice:

Safecracker Ellie McDonnell hasn’t seen Major Ramsey—her handsome but aloof handler in the British government—since their tumultuous mission together three months before, but when she hears about a suspicious robbery in London she feels compelled to contact him. Together they discover that a rash of burglaries leads back to a hotbed of spies in the neutral city Lisbon, Portugal, and an unknown object brought to London by a mysterious courier.

As the thieves become more desperate and their crimes escalate, it becomes imperative that Ellie and Ramsey must beat them at their own game. Fighting shadowy assailants, enemy agents, and the mutual attraction they’ve agreed not to acknowledge, Ellie and Ramsey work together to learn if it truly takes a thief to catch a thief.   (more…)