I was delighted to have the opportunity to read an advance copy of the latest Maggie Hope book, The Prisoner in the Castle, since I have loved the series. In addition to being a suspenseful novel, I learned a lot of interesting things about events that took place in WWII that I hadn't previously known about, despite reading many other books on the subject. As always, the book was well-written and had a great cast of characters. I think MacNeal's plots are improving as the series continues. I highly recommend the book and series. It would particularly appeal to fans of Jacqueline Winspear and Charles Todd.

The adventures of Maggie Hope continue on in this story of her being sent to an island off the coast of Scotland because she knows something that would be dangerous in the wrong hands. There are other "prisoners" like Maggie at this island retreat where no communication with the outside world is allowed. Then, people start turning up dead. Maggie and the others must find out who is killing them before they are all done for.

I really enjoyed the latest installment of the Maggie Hope series. At first I thought that this book would not be as entertaining, as it all takes place on an island, over the course of a week, and the events don't really place Maggie in the middle of the war effort. However, she still has a mystery to solve and is in just as much danger as usual! The author clearly does so much research for these books, and I feel like I learn a little bit more about WWII each time I read one. Can't wait for the next one!

Great characters and setting. Books don't get much better than this!

Maggie Hope is one of the best written, most intelligent heroines to come along in a book series in a long time. The series of events in The Prisoner in the Castle reminded me of an Agatha Christie mystery in some ways, which is fitting for the time period. Susan Elia MacNeal tries to get every detail right, and the research she does for her novels shows. Highly recommended!

PRISONER IN THE CASTLE by SUSAN ELIA MACNEAL
When Pandora opened that box, releasing all the troubles that plague mankind, one thing was left: hope, which helps us to endure despite all the rest . . . such is Maggie Hope. Maggie’s courage, resourcefulness, honor, and loyalty, as well as her excellent training, make her never, ever, give up. There are so many confusing twists in this maze of a story, so many “I didn’t see that coming” moments, that I could barely put it down. MacNeal’s attention to detail and historical accuracy make the narrative ring true, and the lessons and questions of morality and human nature encourage pondering even after the last page is turned. I love when good can come from bad.
Lessons, themes, and imagery for further thought:
“Don’t sit under the apple tree,” Garden of Eden, Eve and the apple, Newton’s first law of motion.
Legend of the Blue Men and memorizing poetry. “Scarra. Like scar. Or scare.” “rain drumming like skeleton fingers” . . . clocks all stopped
Simplicity of math compared to human vagaries . . . “Most Dangerous Game”
“As Dostoyevsky said, ‘People speak sometimes about the animal cruelty of man, but that’s terribly insulting and offensive to animals.”
“We need to teach alternatives to violence. That we’re not beasts, and don’t have to act like them.”
“Does the end ever justify the tainted means?”
and my dad’s favorite saying, “time spent fishing is not deducted from the span of your life.”
* Also, care in editing deserves mention. I read a pre-release “uncorrected” copy, and even so I couldn’t find errors. Well done!

Thank you to NetGalley for an advanced digital copy of this book in return for my review. Here is that review:

I have grown to really love Maggie Hope!! She is an American, born in England, who was orphaned at a young age and raised by a single aunt in and around Boston. She inherited a house in London from a previously-unknown grandmother and travelled to England to see the house and possibly sell it. While there, war broke out and she was drawn into it, first working for Winston Churchill as a secretary, and then being recruited as an agent for SOE, an undercover government group working to win the war. Along the way, she has found out a lot about her life, including the fact that she was not, in fact, orphaned at all, but was sent to America to get her away from her mathematician American father and German spy mother. She also has a half-sister living in Germany!!

Now, she is being held prisoner in a remote island off the coast of Scotland because she knows a secret that the Allies cannot afford to have discovered.

There are several former British spies also on the island, exiled for various reasons that keep them from being viable to use in the field. Slowly, one by one, they are being murdered.

This book is a little different from the others in the series, as Maggie is mostly on her own, without her band of friends and co-workers who have become familiar in the course of these books.

Good read, which is based on a true incident during the war, about which I am sure most of us were previously unaware.

This is another total immersion into WWII. All the grit, danger, tensions, and boredom when waiting.
The characters are marvelously drawn and pulled me right in.
I was left a bit puzzled as to why she was being imprisoned. I couldn't remember enough details from the last story. I think my confusion was at least in part a result of the bureaucratic folly that put her there.
It is amazing to step into these lives and see how they each cope with the isolation and, at least for some, the feeling of uselessness while the war goes on.
It's a fine read and I , again, look forward to further adventures and more expansion of my WWII knowledge.

Not a huge fan of British history and espionage. The story is an important one for making the reader evaluate what should be kept secret and what should be known. But when the social stratification of British society affects decision making it clearly causes problems. I much prefer American characters whose "just do it" mentality moves the story along better. It would have helped if I'd been familiar with previous books in the series.

The Prisoner in the Castle is the 8th in the series of Maggie Hope mysteries. If it has been awhile since you read book #7, I would highly recommend re-reading it, or at least the ending of it prior to reading book #8. It picks up where things left off, but with very little recap.

The Prisoner in the Castle finds Maggie, along with other SOE agents, "in the cooler" on a remote Scottish island. The mystery begins when, one-by-one, agents and associates are murdered. The agents must determine the culprit and his/her motives.

I have been an avid reader of this series since it first began and have anxiously awaited each new book. I hate to say it, but this was my least favorite of the 8. The well worn plot (guests in a house mysteriously murdered one by one) was a disappointment. It was slow moving at first, but picked up speed once non-island activities started being discussed.

I still love the series and Maggie as a character, but this was not my favorite. Looking forward to future Maggie adventures, just not in an Agatha Christie plot.

3.5 starts

I received an advanced reader copy via NetGalley.
Per ARC instructions, review to be posted after publication date.

Thank you NetGalley for an advanced copy. I had gotten out of the habit of reading detective mysteries for whatever reason. The Prisoner in the Castle was a great reintroduction to the genre. The character development was just enough to set up the personalities in my mind’s eye. The exiled setting helps with the physical and mental twists and turns as the storyline progresses. Like other readers, I did not realize that this was part of a series. There are what seems to be vague references to the other books but did not interfere with my enjoyment. I will definitely look for the other books. #ThePrisonerInTheCastle #NetGalley

This wasn't the gritty World War II espionage tale I was hoping for but rather a solid mystery in the Agatha Christie vein. While that's not my favorite genre, this one kept my interest, with great period details and a strong sense of British society at that time (the self-consciousness regarding when to use first names rather than surnames, for instance, was well evoked), and I did not guess the culprit till near the end.

Always enjoy a Maggie Hope story and this one was no exception. Thank you Net Galley for allowing me the opportunity to read this book before it is published. The only downside to this good fortune is the wait will seem even longer for the next one in the series to come out. Maggie, our heroine in these stories, is a strong character and author MacNeal stays true to her character through out the series. I like how the book is laden with information about WWII and England's involvement in it from the SEO (secret service/MI5 per se) side of it. I look forward to the next mission Maggie Hope is embroiled in. If you haven't read any of her books you have time to catch up.

An Agatha Christie type mystery set on a Scottish island during WWII. The heroine in this series is Maggie Hope an SOE agent who is being held captive along with other captured agents. Maggie has to figure out who is picking off agents one-by-one before she becomes the next victim. This is the 8th book in the series. Rated: 3/5

OBSESSED! This book was everything I wanted it to be and more.

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The Prisoner in the Castle by Susan Elia MacNeal

Thanks to NetGalley, I got the opportunity to read this book before it comes out in August. Now, I’ve written about the Maggie Hope series before here and here. I’m such a huge fan. Maggie is just an ordinary woman who does extraordinary things in a dangerous time (WWII). At the end of the previous book, we ended up on a cliffhanger with Maggie being “taken” by her own government.

This book continues from where we left off. Maggie is sent to an island in Scotland (Isle of Scarra) were “spies” who know too much are sent to neutralize them. People can’t spread secrets if they are isolated on an inhospitable island with a dubious past. Similar to the Agatha Christie novel, “And Then There Were None” (one of my absolute favorites), there are then mysterious deaths on the island that are slowly claiming the inhabitants of the island one at a time. Is it the ghost of the old lord of the manor, is it a fellow member of the British spy service gone mad, or is it a double agent in their midst? While all this goes on, Maggie’s friends in London are concerned when no one can determine where she is. Detective Inspector Durgin, erstwhile partner and sometimes love interest, digs deep into Government politics to try and find Maggie. One of his cases needs her testimony to proceed, but he’s also concerned about her on a personal level too. This book hits on all the characters of the previous novels and shows how much Maggie touched lives across London (including the Prime Minister himself).

I was so happy to read this early….I highly recommend this series and this installment especially!

An excellent mystery, in the style of (ugh, I hate that phrase, but it really is applicable here) Agatha Christie mysteries. I didn't realize it was part of a series until I started reading. Some of it might have been better having read all the previous books (obviously) but it didn't affect the overall enjoyment of the story.

Received from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

American Maggie Hope is locked away with other former SOE agents who "know too much" on a remote island off the coast of Scotland in WWII England. When her fellow prisoners start being eliminated, one by one, it's up to Maggie to figure out what's going on.

One of the best Maggie Hope mysteries in a while. Sent to the isolated island of Scarra off the Scottish coast because she knows too much along with ten other Brittish agents. One by one they are being killed off, by who and why? Very atmospheric and nerve racking, makes for a very good read.

When looking for inspiration, one could hardly do better than Dame Agatha Christie, which is exactly what author Susan Elia MacNeal has done. Her latest entry in the World War II era Maggie Hope series has looked to Christie's And Then There Were None for The Prisoner in the Castle's plot. MacNeal even gives Christie's work a nod (under its original title) with Maggie referencing it.

In this incarnation of the classic plot, Maggie and other British agents have been exiled to a Scottish island, each for "going rogue" in some fashion, leaving their handlers to question their fitness for future missions. Of course, Maggie has had good reason for her deviation from the rules--not so much for some of the other agents who all have secrets that make them vulnerable.

Exile on an isolated Scottish island would be punishment enough in itself, but soon dead bodies begin piling up. Amid a group of people who have all been trained to kill, the only thing that seems to eliminate a suspect is his or her own death. A shaken Maggie has to look beyond the obvious to find the killer, even as a monster storm keeps help from arriving in time to prevent more deaths.

Back in England, Maggie's friends, who have assumed that she has been off on secret mission, begin to look for her at the behest of a police detective who needs her testimony to ensure the conviction of a vicious killer. MacNeal creates considerable tension as rescue and death inch ever closer to Maggie.

MacNeal's books are meticulously researched and she weaves fascinating fact into her fiction. Maggie Hope is a stand out series.

Full Disclosure--Net Gallery and the publisher provided me with a digital ARC of this book. This is my honest review.

This is an excellent addition to a well written and thoroughly researched series about Maggie Hope, who, although American born, is now a top operative for the British Special Operations Executive during World War II. Maggie is an intelligent and exceptionally brave woman who has been dealing with the horrors of life during the Second World War and once again finds herself in a life or death situation. This is a compelling and engrossing story and I highly recommend it.