Rapscallion Magazine Book Review: Winter In Madrid, by C.J. Sansom.
It was one of those ‘what it’ moments in World War Two when Britain nearly went to war with Russia after Finland was invaded in 1939, and Spain nearly sided with Hitler in a deal to re-establish the Spanish Empire. It meant that Madrid was swarming with secret agents seeking to influence Franco’s Fascist regime one way or the other. One of them was Harry Brett, sent there by the British Secret Service to check out an old school oddball who appears to be involved in a gold mine.
In Christopher John Sansom’s novel Winter In Madrid, we experience the cold and the misery of the city in the winter of 1940-41 following the shortages, hunger and injustices after the end of the civil war that wrecked the country. There’s a continued sense of danger for reluctant agent Harry Brett who isn’t cut out to be a spy but would be better at helping in a refugee camp or counselling mentally damaged young women – which he does in his relationship with Sofia – who he meets by accident when helping her brother (a fellow spy) after he’s attacked by dogs.
We quickly learn about the privileged lives of those who did well out of the civil war or were close to Franco who live in luxury compared to those scraping a living in the ruins of the capital. And even worse are the lot of Franco’s prisoners following the fall of the Republican regime like Bernie. We see their desperate lives through the eyes of the British volunteer for the International Brigade whose former lover Barbara slowly puts together an escape for him – hampered by her ghastly partner Sandy who is in with the fascists.
I began reading this novel when I was on holiday in Madrid several years ago but got only so far after switching to re-reading Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell. It was partly due to the way he described Madrid during fighting when he was stationed on a hotel roof – which I was able to track down. Now some years later I picked up Winter in Madrid again skim read the first half and finally read the final chapters – partly because I hoped Bernie would be spring from his concentration camp. The strands of the plot all come together in a brutal and dramatic climax in which survival, love and loss are the main themes in an epic struggle between good and evil portrayed in Sansom’s page turner novel. Sadly, we know that although Spain didn’t join the Axis powers the country was to endue decades of Franco’s rule.
The Catholic Church – albeit the part that supported the inhumane treatment of orphans and prisoners of war – let alone women – came out very badly. It was a particularly brutal civil war in which the church sided with the fascists – and the reverberations continue to this day. Franco’s supporters and fascists are portrayed as enemies to the British officials who still had an embassy in Madrid where Harry worked as a translator. And the city of Madrid is an added character in the novel with is badly lit streets, damaged buildings, beggars and packs of feral dogs scraping a living what is now a transformed metropolis with its immaculate parks and restored buildings.
But in the winter of 1940-41 – at the time the story is set in – it was touch and go as to whether Spain would join Nazi German and declare war on Britain – which added to the narrative giving Harry Brett’s struggle a ‘what if’ edge.
Harry Mottram
The novel is widely available as a paperback. Christopher John Sansom was a lawyer originally, then turned writer and is best known for his historical crime novels in the Matthew Shardlake series. Born in 1952 he died in April of this year.