Winter in Madrid: A Novel

This is a fabulously compelling story set in the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War and during 1940 Madrid as the question of whether Franco will join Hitler in the war is on everyone's lips. We follow a couple of story lines-- even back to 1931 when two of the characters were in Spain together before war touched the country- while they were still recovering from WWI, in fact. Fascists, spies, and a story of two lovers separated by fate. Flashbacks to England and childhood also play a part. A thick tome with an engaging plot, it reads real as well as heartbreaking in parts. An older book but it still resonates. Lots of intrigue. Recommended for those who like many layers in their stories.

Many novels have been written with the Spanish civil war 1936-1939 as a backgroung. The original idea of this particular one is that it happens just after the war.Winter in Madrid tells a beautiful story of spies, reckless ambassadors and predatory businessmen. The victims are the poor people of post civil-war Madrid and some romantic foreigners. The story is well structured and makes you want to continue reading until the final climax, a bit too grand for my taste.The atmosphere of Madrid in the 1940's is very well described and it seems quite real to me. I am too young to remember anything about those times, but both General Franco and his entourage act in a way that coincides with what I've heard.The only critic I would make is that many expressions are used in Spanish in the English text, and that some mistakes appear in them. I think the publisher should have verified the correctness of those expressions beforehand.

The premise of the novel I found very compelling, because I don't know of any other novel that deals with the nature of Britain's wartime relationship (economically and diplomatically) with Francoist Spain.In Sampson's novel, you have Harry Brett, a "traumatized veteran of Dunkirk turned reluctant spy" in Britain's Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), who is sent to Spain under diplomatic cover in mid-summer 1940. While in Spain, he tries to ingratiate himself with a shady Englishman involved in some mining extraction enterprise which is proported to sizeably increase Spain's gold reserves (which had been depleted by Stalin during the civil war there) --- and thus strengthen Franco's bid to speed up Spain's recovery.Sampson has a lot of interconnected backstories among the various main characters of the novel. Not all of them, however, helped to make the novel more compelling to me. That is what frustrated me the most. The subject matter was really interesting stuff (!!!) But the development of the plot and its denouement left a lot to be desired.

C.J. Sansom is a master of the historical novel and like his Matthew Shardlake books this one succeeds in totally immersing you in a different time and place. He makes you feel like you've taken a time machine back to Madrid in 1940, when Franco had won Spain's Civil War and imposed a dictatorship on the country that was to last 35 years.I spent six weeks in Madrid in 1972, when Franco was still in power and the odious Guardia Civil was still omnipresent. It was with a shock that I realized that the action of this novel, set in 1940, was closer to 1972 than my stay in Spain is to today! While Spain had largely recovered from the ravages of the Civil War by the time I was there, Sansom's descriptions nonetheless took me back to my own experience of the oppressiveness of Franco's rule. Even the short scene in Burgos, where I had simply stopped on a weekend trip, brought memories rushing back.Here is another hero named Harry, this one Harry Brett, who actually is similar in some respects to Goddard's Harry Barnett. Like an Eric Ambler character, Harry is an innocent caught up in an espionage plot that makes him confused and uncomfortable, but as a loyal, if naive, British subject, he dutifully goes along with his assignment to spy on an old chum from public school days who has landed in Madrid and appears to literally have found a gold mine there.In fact, Harry and this old chum, Sandy Forsyth, who was expelled for a nasty prank against one of the teachers, and a third student at the school, Bernie Piper, seem linked by a strange karma. Piper joined the International Brigades to fight for the Spanish Republic and was missing in action, believed killed. His former lover, Barbara Clare, a Red Cross nurse, turns in her grief to Forsyth, whom she meets by an improbable but nonetheless believable coincidence. Harry knew Barbara from the time in 1937 when he came over to console her on the news of Bernie's death.There is a love triangle, though not perhaps the one you expect, as the plot develops in a fashion that seems leisurely but actually moves at a good clip, considering the action is compressed into a period of just a few weeks. Harry's very naivete makes him somewhat successful as a spy, and he is able to win Forsyth's confidence and find out about the gold mine, which Sandy is trying to sell to the government as a way to pay for much-needed imports.Against the backdrop of a Madrid in ruins from the war and on the brink of starvation from successive crop failures and a British blockade on many imports, Harry must deceive not only Sandy, but also Barbara, who has secret plans of her own. The deprivation and oppression are palpable as Sansom skillfully layers the compromises and betrayals each of these British characters, as well as their Spanish counterparts, must make.There are a couple of flaws. For some inscrutable reason, Sansom seems obsessed with the idea of having everybody (except Harry) smoking all the time. Yes, it's fine to remind the reader that people in this period, in Spain as well as England, smoked all the time, but he carries it to a level of distraction. He could have made his point with a fraction of the references to characters lighting up and blowing out clouds of smoke. He once tells us twice within the space of two pages that Sandy "lit a cigar," though insufficient time has elapsed to have finished the first one and it is clearly an authorial and copy editing oversight.Another flaw is that the action of the novel, despite all the frost and cold, takes place in the autumn. Harry, in fact, does not spend the winter in Madrid, but arrives in early autumn and actually leaves on the first day of winter. Even if Sansom also means the title to be metaphorical, it is technically "Autumn in Madrid" and much of the plot would not work if it was actually winter.These only detract marginally from a book that gives you characters to care about, a meticulous recreation of a period and a place that are crucial to understanding the 20th century, and wonderful immersion in language and style.

The multiple leading characters with their own stories take time to coalesce lessening the dramatic intensity until the final chapters, but the book is an authentic rendering of the complex ideologies within the Spanish civil war and its aftermath.

Love this book. So well written and brilliant characters. What a great author.

Bien documenté, bien construit et gardant le suspens d’un bout à l’autre du roman. Un roman non superficiel avec des personnages dont les différents caractères sont bien exposés. Au fur et à mesure de l’évolution du roman, on s’interroge : qui se tirera de l’affaire ?

The book gives a view of the Spanish civil war and the effect it had on normal citizens without making it look as a history chapter. It turns out to be a gripping thriller with quite a few surprises.

The Civil War times were cruel and very sad. Winter in Madrid shows that clearly: the living conditions, the people, a country divided into many parties, the breakdown of society. The characters in the novel are well drawn and keep our interest till the very end. The events within the story reflect those of society at large, making their credibility greater. Some would say the story is predictable at certain points, but maybe that depends on how closely you follow the story and how much it means to you. For those people who love Spain in the present day, the past revisited in novel form gives many insights into la nature humaine.

Very well written, good character development and strong plot. Excitement and tension builds through great writing rather than resorting to non-credible, super heroics. I will be seeking out other books from this author.I listened to large parts on the audible/whispersync, which is very well read, and only a few extra $s when buying the kindle book.