Thirty-three year old Kim Tavistock is looking for something to do with herself. Recently removed from a newspaper job in the U.S., Kim is back in England and living with her father. It’s 1936 and jobs are hard to find and women are the last in line to get them.
Perhaps in these early days leading up to World War II, Kim might find employ as a spy for King and Country. She does, after all, possess a very unusual talent. Ever since she was 12, she’s been able to inspire people to reveal embarrassing secrets. This “spill talent” made things awkward for potential boyfriends, but it might be useful in espionage endeavors. That’s what Kim is hoping.
Contrary to popular assumptions, however, being a spy isn’t the glamorous career people make it out to be. Kim quickly finds out that it’s a tawdry job, morally wretched and liable to get her killed – especially when she’s attempting to infiltrate a nest of shady Germans promoting their Nazi agenda.
The Germans have a crazy plan to invade England by building a Boom Tube-like conduit across the North Sea. To do this, they’re conscripting a team of metahumans with extraordinary preternatural abilities. The key to the whole thing rests on the shoulders of a high-powered “chorister” who’s able to aggregate Nazi Übermensch for maximum carnage.
Kim is determined to disrupt the oncoming invasion using her unique talent. Like a guitarist endlessly searching for the perfect chord, she’s consorting with Sicherheitsdienst agents looking for the defining spill. She’s a bit naïve but fearless nonetheless. She doesn’t consider herself a superhero, a Valkyrie warrior, or anything so presumptuous, but one way or another she’s going to use her spill skillz to keep England safe.
The years just prior to WWII represent an undeclared shadow war of subterfuge, filled with spies, assassins, powerbrokers, puppet masters, political agitators, disrupters, alchemists, and superheroes. As such, it serves as the perfect milieu for Kay Kenyon’s new alt-history series featuring superheroes with highly unusual and arcane talents. England is lucky to have Kim “Nazi Smasher” Tavistock on its payroll. To be continued in Serpent in the Heather (available April 2018).
[At the Table of Wolves / By Kay Kenyon / First Printing: July 2017 / ISBN: 9781481487788]
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