Description
AGENT ZO tells the incredible story of courageous resistance fighter Elżbieta Zawacka, aka Elizabeth Watson but best known as ‘Zo’. During the Second World War, Zo was the only woman to reach London as an emissary of the Polish Home Army command, bringing vital mircofilm. As the only female member of the Polish elite special forces – the ‘Silent Unseen’ – she also became the only woman to parachute from Britain to Nazi-German occupied Poland. There, while being hunted by the Gestapo, who arrested her entire family, she took a key role in the largest organised act of defiance against Nazi Germany – the Warsaw Uprising.
After the war, Zo was demobbed as one of the most highly decorated Polish women in history. Yet the Soviet-backed communist regime not only imprisoned her, but also ensured that her remarkable story remained hidden. Now, through new archival research and exclusive interviews with people who knew and fought alongside Zo, Clare Mulley brings this forgotten heroine back to life, transforming the way we see the history of women’s agency in the Second World War.
‘Deeply researched and written with verve. Thoughtful as well as action-packed’, The Times (London)
‘Industrial strength heroism, told with sympathy & feeling’, The Literary Review
‘Page-turning… Fascinating… Poignant… This excellent account is a tour de force’, Military History Matters
‘Gripping, moving and important: an amazing and until-now neglected story of female WW2 heroism and secret derring-do. This tale of the resistance fighter Agent Zo is amazingly told and deeply researched by the excellent historian of WW2 espionage Clare Mulley’, Simon Sebag Montefiore, The World, a Family History; Young Stalin; Jerusalem
‘Agent Zo is a triumph… Absolutely essential reading’, Hallie Rubenhold, The Five
‘A terrific story, told with passion and authority. Not simply a page-turner, this is an important addition to the literature of WW2, a story for our times about female heroism’, Anne Sebba, Ethel Rosenberg; Jennie Churchill
‘A fine piece of military history, Polish history and women’s history, all written in a gripping style. Cries out to be filmed’, Andrew Roberts, George III, Churchill, Napoleon
‘The astonishing story of an extraordinary woman’, Jonathan Freedland, The Escape Artist
Clare Mulley is an award-winning author focused on female experience during the Second World War. Her books include AGENT ZO, about the only woman to parachute from Britain to enemy-occupied Poland, to play a key role in the largest organised act of defiance against Nazi German occupation, as well as THE WOMEN WHO FLEW FOR HITLER, THE SPY WHO LOVED and THE WOMAN WHO SAVED THE CHILDREN. Popular on TV, radio and pods, Clare reviews widely across the papers, and has served as a judge for the Historical Writers Association and Biographers Club book prizes. She is a recipient of the Polish honour, the Bene Merito, and the Daily Mail Biographers Club Prize. She lives in Essex with the sculptor Ian Wolter, too many books, and a dog who needs more baths. www.claremulley.com
