The wreckage of Russian fighter ace Natalya Azarova's plane is unearthed in 2000 after her disappearance in the closing months of World War 2.
But there's no body, leaving her former flight commander and lover Valentin Orlov, now a decorated general, still unable to resolve Kremlin claims she was in fact a German spy.
Then there's Lily, a young Australian working in Moscow, escaping from tragedy back home, who chances across an elderly woman who draws her into the Azarova mystery.
Alexandra intertwines the main characters through past and present storylines, using Azarova to recall her experiences of growing up and living through the madness of 1930s Stalinist Russia - the privileges, paranoia and purges - and into the horrors and continuing suspicions of a world war.
Sure, some of the plots seem predictable. Or are they? It's a book you'll be reading late into the night. However, someone really must tell Belinda Alexandra to employ a new cover designer.
- Peter Donaldson is ODT deputy news editor.
