The Information Officer: A Novel [Audiobook, Unabridged] [Audio CD]

Mark Mills (Author), Robin Sachs (Reader)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 2, 2010

Malta, April 1942--Max Chadwick is the military officer charged with managing information and maintaining morale on the tiny Mediterranean island, a strategic lynchpin in the war. Bombs rain from the sky at all hours of the day and night, as the Maltese and their British protectors fiercely cling to the rocky outcropping that is all that stands between the Axis and total dominance of the Mediterranean theater. When a Maltese woman is murdered, and evidence links her death to a British serviceman, Max is faced with the possibility that the fragile and crucial esprit de corps could shatter. Forced to keep his investigation a secret, Max sets out to unravel the mystery and unmask the killer. At stake is not only his only life and that of the woman he loves, but a conflict with far broader consequences.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The prolonged and intense Axis bombing of Malta and the British efforts to deliver squadrons of new Spitfire fighters in aid of the strategic Mediterranean island's defense provide the dramatic backdrop for Mills's WWII spy thriller. Maj. Max Chadwick negotiates a narrow path feeding info via his weekly bulletin in the Maltese newspaper Il-Berqa, putting a positive spin on Malta's depressing situation, and seeking to separate rumor from fact. When Chadwick learns that a British submariner may be a serial killer targeting sherry queens (e.g., dance hostesses who worked the bars and bawdy music halls in the capital city's disreputable quarter), he has to consider carefully what to reveal. If the murders become public, they could tip the precarious balance of local support against the British. Mills (Amagansett) paints a vivid portrait of a tenacious people, embattled and besieged troops, and a principled man trying to resolve the conflict between duty and justice. (Feb.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Bookmarks Magazine

Mark Mills's third novel--as magnificent as it is sober and chilling--evokes the horror of Malta under siege. The war, however, provides more than a backdrop to this superb spy thriller, gripping mystery, and work of historical fiction; it directs Max's choices as he sets out to investigate the murders. Critics lauded the plot's complexity, smooth pacing, and attention to detail. However, it was the sadistic killer--and his incisive, depraved musings--that really caught most reviewers' attention and that elevates this novel above its genre. In sum: a standout work deserving of a wide readership. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Audio CD
• Publisher: Blackstone Audio, Inc.; Unabridged edition (February 2, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1441721282
• ISBN-13: 978-1441721280
• Product Dimensions: 5.9 x 5.2 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (63 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,430,791 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Mark Mills graduated from Cambridge University in 1986. He has lived in both Italy and France, and has written for the screen. His first novel, 'The Whaleboat House', won the 2004 Crime Writer's Association for Best Novel by a debut author. His second, 'The Savage Garden', was a Richard and Judy Summer Read and No 1 bestseller. He lives in Oxford with his wife and two children.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

34 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars "This is it--the last roll of the dice.", February 17, 2010

By 

Mary Whipple (New England) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Information Officer: A Novel (Hardcover)

(What's this?)

(3.5 stars) Major Max Chadwick is the Information Officer for the British army on Malta during World War II. "Loyal Little Malta," a British colony strategically located between Sicily and North Africa, has been bombarded non-stop by the Germans and Italians for many months. Though British submarines based on Malta have been interrupting German shipping in the Mediterranean since the war began, the British are almost helpless against the Axis air power. In April, 1941, "the Luftwaffe flew a staggering 9600 sorties against the island, almost double the number for March, which itself had shattered all previous records." Virtually all the defending Spitfires and Hurricanes have been destroyed, and the total number of aircraft available to protect Malta, at this point, is a mere ten.

While Max tries to keep up the wartime morale of the island with his posts, the raids continue, but so does the social life for the British, and when Carmela Cassari, a "sherry queen" from the Blue Parrot turns up dead, Max's best friend, Dr. Freddie Lambert, secretly brings Max to the mortuary to see her suspicious wounds-and a torn shoulder tab from a British uniform. Two other sherry queens have also died recently, and Max and Freddie conclude that a serial killer is on the loose, and that this killer is a British officer.

With the never-ending air raids, the growing number of civilian deaths, and morale getting low, Max is not sure how to deal with the three murders, which so far have not been connected in the public mind to a serial killer. Knowing that his reports to his superiors will be ignored, he decides to investigate on his own, using some of his own contacts for information. Who to trust is a problem, however, since someone on the island with high-level knowledge (perhaps a British officer) is funneling strategic information to the Germans.

Author Mark Mills creates an atmospheric and ambitious novel of Malta, which, during World War II, was "the most bombed place on earth," and he attempts a wide scope in less than three hundred pages. Unfortunately, this allows him little opportunity for full development of any of his plot lines. It not a war novel in the traditional sense, as the strategizing and maneuvering which one sees in most war novels are not significant here. How the Maltese kept themselves going would have been a vibrant topic for discussion and illustration in this novel, but nearly all the important characters here are British (with one American), the Maltese remaining on the periphery. A section which appears at the end of each chapter takes us into the mind of the killer of the sherry queens, suggesting a psychological emphasis, but the killer's personality does not jell, and the discovery of the killer comes as a surprise.

Still, for those interested in reading an unusual novel about "this little lump of rock in the middle of the Mediterranean" and its amazing survival during the horrors of World War II, this novel opens up many avenues for further exploration. The references to real places and events are numerous (and fun to look up on Google) and a sense of what the island looks like shines through. Though the novel has its weaknesses, it still made me want to know more about the island, and the easy internet research satisfied my curiosity. Mary Whipple

40 of 46 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Information Overload?, January 28, 2010

By 

Jill I. Shtulman (Chicago, IL USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Information Officer: A Novel (Hardcover)

(What's this?)

The Information Officer isn't exactly a period piece; it's not exactly an espionage thriller, or a murder mystery or a war romance or a detective story. It's a little bit of all of these. And herein lies the problem; to this reader, the book succeeds most as a period piece.

The book is set in 1942 in Malta, where regular bombing campaigns and the strangling of supply lines conducted by the Germans threaten to bring this proud country to its knees. A band of English soldiers are called upon to aid the local Maltese. The key protagonist, Max Chadwick, is an information officer whose job is to bolster the morale of both the Maltese islanders and British troops; in essence, he's an officer of propaganda. All is going reasonably well until a girl is found murdered with a rag torn from a soldier's uniform in her hand. Max must do everything in his power to not disrupt the tenuous accord between the British and the locals.

The Information Officer works best as an expertly researched period; a look into bygone times when the Maltese stood bloody and unbowed against the German Lutwaffe. It is less successful as a thinly-plotted cloak-and-daggers mystery.

The narrative tends to be way too stilted - almost like an imitation of a film noir - with too many characters flitting in and out. For example, at the beginning of the book, we're introduced to the young officer Pemberton, who is set to work for Max Chadwick. We get all sorts of detail about him and then - nothing. He reappears briefly and then disappears forever. Other characters are introduced with lengthy four or five page back histories, only to play minor supporting roles. Detail is great, but in this case, it doesn't contribute to the arc of the story; it subtracts from it. The flashbacks further remove the reader from the building plot crescendo.

In the end, the novel just fails to engage and becomes a somewhat trudging read. This might have been an adrenalin-racing thriller about a serial killer preying on barmaids during a claustrophobic time (Eric Larsen accomplishes this kind of feat well in Devil and the White City). Instead, it seems more like an accurately written historical piece with a murder tagged on in an unmemorable way - sort of a mystery-by-the-numbers. Granted, I do not normally read crime fiction, but the excitement, alas, was not there for me.

14 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Sadly Dull, February 25, 2010

By 

Charlotte Vale-Allen (CT USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Information Officer: A Novel (Hardcover)

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I loved Amagansett and so looked forward with much anticipation to The Information Officer. Alas, the book is so mannered, so filled with dreary background details, that the novel is all but unreadable. It is stiff and turgid. There is such a lack of narrative pacing, such a lack of compelling characters that it's simply painful trudging through the prose. To say I am disappointed truly doesn't begin to cover my bemusement. I just don't understand how the gifted writer who created Amagansett could have lost his way so badly with The Information Officer.