This thrilling novel follows the exploits of the fictional Tat’yana Levchenko, a World War II female Soviet sniper in Sevastopol. Told in first person, the work jumps right into action, with the protagonist waiting patiently to make her next kill. Battle hardened, fearless, with nothing to lose, Tat’yana’s character and voice is one of the most compelling I’ve read in a while: “My life had long ago stopped mattering to me. It was but an instrument of my revenge.” With hundreds of recorded kills, sniping is her method of striking back at the Nazis who have upended her life, and of those she loves. As a “woman [who] has humbled the Reich” and is a decorated heroine of the Soviet Union, Tat’yana is invited to the United States, to tour with First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt. The two women strike a friendship, but soon Tat’yana is caught in a web of deceit, as the Soviets force her to act as their spy, in gathering US intelligence. Fraught with tension and suspense, White’s writing excels in describing battle scenes, and Tat’yana’s divided loyalties. He captures her emotions, experiences—and rampant sexism—faced by a woman soldier: “‘Comrade Levchenko,’ they [Communist Party officials] would ask of me, ‘How does one so lovely become such an accomplished killer?'”
Readers may find the story’s romance plot, of the heroine’s involvement with an American interpreter (erroneously referred to as “translator”), a bit clichéd and predictable, but the novel never loses its momentum, as our heroine suddenly vanishes—without a trace. Equal parts wartime thriller, romance, and mystery, as the novels traces why and where the “Beautiful Assassin” has disappeared, this is one most gripping historical fiction novels I have recently read. White clearly did his research on the figures, places, battles, weapons, etc., of the era. The novel is a testament to how “unlike the other major belligerents in World War II, only the Soviets found it necessary to enlist women.” The fictional protagonist, based off real life female Soviet sniper Lyudmila Pavlichenko, represents an intriguing slice of the “woman power” behind the Soviet war machine. For history buffs and those interested in women’s narratives, Beautiful Assassin more than hits the mark.
Beautiful Assassin by Michael White, Harper Perennial, 2011, 460 pages.
~LMC