-
See Our Best Book
Club Books of 2026!
Inspired by the true story of Melita Norwood, an eighty-seven-year old woman who was unmasked as the KGB's longest serving British spy in 1999, Red Joan is a well-researched and briskly paced historical novel that questions the black-and-white morality of wartime society. Brilliantly structured and psychologically acute, this compelling novel provides no easy answers, instead offering a kaleidoscope of conflicting choices and questionable motives. And once the authorities close in, is there ever such a thing as atonement and forgiveness?
"Rooney's prose is smooth and does not get in the way of her compelling, truth-is-stranger-than-fiction story." - Publishers Weekly
"With genuine reports from archives and scholarly sources underlying the tale, Rooney convincingly and gracefully fleshes out this antiheroine whose survival instincts belie her dreams of a contented family life" - Library Journal
"Rooney is a novelist at home with life's ambiguities, her plotting pleasingly intricate, her narrative richly textured." - Telegraph (UK)
"An exciting and intelligent novel... Rooney's re-creation of the politics of the day is brilliant." - The Times (UK)
This information about Red Joan was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Jennie Rooney was born in Liverpool in 1980. She studied History at the University of Cambridge and taught English in France before moving to London to work as a lawyer. Her first novel, Inside the Whale, was shortlisted for the Costa First Novel Award.
The Sister's Curse
by Nicola Solvinic
The Lost Story of Eva Fuentes
by Chanel Cleeton
The Vanishing Place
by Zoë Rankin
 (1).gif)
Be sincere, be brief, be seated
Click Here to find out who said this, as well as discovering other famous literary quotes!
Can you name the title?
Test your book knowledge with our daily trivia challenge!
Your guide toexceptional books
BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.
