Looking for a exciting summer read that combines WWII bravery, international intrique and cheese? Look no further than OPERATION MINCEMEAT by Ben Macintyre.
Macintrye's riverting read chronicles the legendary Operation Mincemeat, in which a sad sack suicide was dressed up as a naval officer and floated out the Spanish coast with his pockets and attache case packed with false "top secret" war plans. The goal: to mislead the Germans, allowing the Allies to invade Sicily and win the war. Brilliant!
The hero of this tale is spy master Ewen Montagu, "a shrewd criminal lawyer and workaholic with a prematurely receding hairline and a penchant for stinky cheese." At University, along with his brother, Ivor (a Soviet spy, no less), they founded the Cheese Eaters League:
Ivor and Ewen shared a passion for cheese and set up a dining club to import and taste the most exotic specimens from around the world: camel's milk cheese, Middle Eastern goat cheese, cheese made from the milk of the long-horned Afghan sheep. "Our greatest ambition was to get whale's milk cheese," Ewen wrote, and to this end he contacted a whaling company to arrange that "if a mother whale was killed the milk should be 'cheesed' and sent to us."
Disgusting but also a little bit fascinating.
Here's the New York Times review. If your curiousity is piqued, rush out to buy this great book (and others!) at Barnes&Noble, Borders or, better yet, your local independent bookshop.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/16/books/review/Conant-t.html?pagewanted=all
Tuesday, July 6, 2010
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