In 1941 the European war ended in the Farthing Peace, a rapprochement between Britain and Nazi Germany. The balls and banquets of Britains upper class never faltered, while British ships ferried undesirables across the Channel to board the cattle cars headed east.
Peter Carmichael is commander of the Watch, Britains distinctly British secret police. Its his job to warn the Prime Minister of treason, to arrest plotters, and to discover Jews. The midnight knock of a Watchman is the most dreaded sound in the realm.
Now, in 1960, a global peace conference is convening in London, where Britain, Germany, and Japan will oversee the final partition of the world. Hitler is once again on British soil. So is the long exiled Duke of Windsorand the rising gangs of British Power streetfighters, who consider the Government soft, may be the former kings bid to stage a coup détat.
Amidst all this, two of the most unlikely persons in the realm will join forces to oppose the fascists: a debutante whose greatest worry until now has been where to find the right string of pearls, and the Watch Commander himself.
"Walton's understated prose and deft characterizations elevate this above similar works." - Publishers Weekly.
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Jo Walton won the Hugo and Nebula Awards in 2012 for her novel Among Others. Before that, she won the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer, and her novel Tooth and Claw won the World Fantasy Award in 2004. The novels of her Small Change sequence—Farthing, Ha'penny, and Half a Crown—have won acclaim ranging from national newspapers to the Romantic Times Critics' Choice Award. A native of Wales, she lives in Montreal.
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