Chosen as a BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR by NPR the New York Public Library Amazon the Seattle Times the Washington Independent Review of Books PopSugar the Minneapolis Star Tribune BookBrowse the Spectator and the Times of London

Winner of the Plutarch Award for Best Biography

ExcellentThis book is as riveting as any thriller and as hard to put down The New York Times Book Review

A compelling biography of a masterful spy and a reminder of what can be done with a few brave people and a little resistance NPR

A meticiulous history that reads like a thrillerBen Macintyre

A neverbeforetold story of Virginia Hall the American spy who changed the course of World War II from the author of Clementine

In 1942 the Gestapo sent out an urgent transmission She is the most dangerous of all Allied spies We must find and destroy her

The target in their sights was Virginia Hall a Baltimore socialite who talked her way into Special Operations Executive the spy organization dubbed Winston Churchills Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare She became the first Allied woman deployed behind enemy lines anddespite her prosthetic leghelped to light the flame of the French Resistance revolutionizing secret warfare as we know it

Virginia established vast spy networks throughout France called weapons and explosives down from the skies and became a linchpin for the Resistance Even as her face covered wanted posters and a bounty was placed on her head Virginia refused order after order to evacuate She finally escaped through a deathdefying hike over the Pyrenees into Spain her cover blown But she plunged back in adamant that she had more lives to save and led a victorious guerilla campaign liberating swathes of France from the Nazis after DDay

Based on new and extensive research Sonia Purnell has for the first time uncovered the full secret life of Virginia Hallan astounding and inspiring story of heroism spycraft resistance and personal triumph over shocking adversity A Woman of No Importance is the breathtaking story of how one womans fierce persistence helped win the war