Young Jack Kennedy is tasked by President Roosevelt with unearthing some secrets at the onset of WWII. His journey takes him to Europe, where he is chased by enemy agents, embarks on a passionate love affair, and seeks to possess something which threatens to unravel his family's legacy.

This was a fast-paced thriller. I don't normally go for historical fiction centered on such well-known personalities. However, this one felt right. The author got the "real" characters right and the whole thing just worked.

Fun reading. ( )

'The mess.
That's what he was to them.
Not Jack Kennedy, failed choirboy; not the Black Sheep, or the kid lost in his brother Joe's light; not the best friend Kick would ever have; not the wiry skeleton incandescent with energy, or the crack sailor tipping his keel in Nantucket Sound; not Roosevelt's man with his own reckless brand of guts. Just the mess.'

I had no idea what to expect from a novel pitching a young JFK as a pre-war spy for FDR in Europe, but I was thoroughly entertained throughout! For a start, the fiction, dramatic and completely implausible in places, is supported by fact - Jack really did travel through Europe in 1939, while his family were still in London. Who knows what he really did while he was there?

Okay, so we all know that he was never a junior James Bond, but Francine Mathews is very convincing! And she seems to have a small crush on JFK too, which helps. The plot is a rollicking undercover adventure, complete with femme fatales, murder and secret coding machines, but I loved reading about Jack's home life more, and his close bond with sister Kick. We get a good sense of the real Jack, sickly and scruffy, jealous of his brother Joe, but also wonderfully charming and ever curious. He might just have made a great spy at that, recklessly courting danger while dodging the 'curtain of Boredom or Death'.

Good fun, and a chance to learn more about JFK's early years without reading yet another biography (which I also like to do!) ( )

It was difficult to wrap my head around this. I love historical fiction, but fiction set in a real historical situation... this took a leap of faith (although I'd believe SOME of it if you told me it was true). ( )

This book was weird for me. I loved the historical fiction aspects of it but at times it also got boring. It was also hard for me to picture JFK as a spy for some reason. But it was actually a good book, the plot just got a little confusing sometimes. ( )

Fairly fast-paced if far-fetched spy novel. ( )