This is the true story of the author's father's experiences working in the British Embassy in Madrid during World War II. It goes into his involvement with both the diplomatic efforts to keep Spain out of the war, and the intelligence efforts to counter Nazi influence and intelligence in Spain.

It also details the attempts by Soviet moles within British intelligence (notably the infamous Kim Philby) to discredit Burns as a Fascist sympathizer.

I sometimes found the narrative to be a little confused and the prose somewhat awkward. The reading experience was also diminished by frequent copy-editing mistakes.

Papa Spy

When I was growing up a popular topic was “what did your dad do in the war?” Papa Spy is a son’s story of what his father did in World War II. All action occurs before the son’s birth, so the story comes from old documents, recently released documents and interviews with those involved at the time. One interview was the main character, the author’s father – Thomas Burns. Thomas Burns was a publisher, a communicator with many people and a networker among many people. He brought writers and publishers together to produce books. Burns was a “cradle Catholic” from birth to death he was educated and trained in the beliefs and functions of Catholicism. Born in Chile he grew up in England. The “stigma” of being Catholic and a “foreigner” in England then was part of his life. When World War II began he joined the Ministry of Information - read that as propaganda central. The war was a war of blood and, in places where the blood wasn’t being shed, a war of words to convince people to not join the fight. For Tom Burns, that nation was Spain. Still an outsider to most of the intelligence community he added suspicion by being on Franco’s side in the Spanish Civil War. Franco was Catholic. Franco was also a fascist, like Hitler. Burns job was to develop and maintain contacts in Franco’s government to keep British intelligence informed, generate propaganda to offset the German propaganda in Spain and stop Spain from joining the war - on the Axis’ side. Burns was required to contact and network with individuals considered the enemy. He worked on a tightrope and under surveillance for his beliefs throughout the war.

In addition to the intrigues of the war, Tom Burns lived with the intrigues of love. A long-running affair with one of the royalty was disrupted by the war, but not without heartbreak along the way. He suffered guilt that his war effort put him out of harm’s way while friends were being bombed in London. The struggles of passion ended with the war’s end, new love grew and Tom Burns returned to publishing, but he continued all his life to be a part of those who fought the war differently than with a gun.

Honestly I struggled with the first part of this book. Too many names and places left me working to figure out who was who and where. Once the war began and situations became clearer I was caught up in the action of the struggle. The interweaving of war, love, prejudice (especially from those with goals other than winning the war) made for an intriguing tale which happens to have been real life. I give this book four stars. ( )

“Papa Spy” by Jimmy Burns tells the story of Great Britain’s efforts to keep Spain neutral during World War II.
It is a story worth telling yet lacking much coverage in the general history of WWII. The Spanish leader Franco came to power just prior to the outbreak of WWII with some aid from Hitler and the Nazis. Britain feared his fascist leanings and thought he could side with Germany and all but shut the Allies of the Mediterranean Sea.
The focus of the book is Tom Burns, a publisher before the war, he had many useful contacts when he became press attaché in the British embassy in Madrid. His job was to dispense positive Allied propaganda into a Spanish media that was sympathetic toward Germany. Through this position he covertly sought out Spaniards who favored the allies and could influence Franco or those close to him to keep Spain out of the war.
Author Jimmy burns is the son of Tom Burns who did most of his research for this work after his fathers death. Though there are plenty of first person citations not much is gleamed directly from Tom Burns. There is quite a cast of characters and many interwoven subplots which seems appropriate for a book centered around diplomacy. However, this is not James Bond espionage and the actual points that led to the end results do not seem clear to me.
This book is entertaining and readable but it seems to fall between two audiences. It appears to be protracted and confusing for the casual reader of history and lacking of focus and depth for the more attuned fans of history ( )

I was looking forward to reading Papa Spy. Sorry to say it was a huge disappointment. There were way to many characters, and so much information that in my opinion wasn't needed to further the story along. The story was supposed to be about Tom Burns, and his efforts in Spain during WW11 to try and keep Spain neutral. ( )

This book was disappointing. While the premise sounds exciting, spies in Spain during World War II, the style in which it was written causes the book to fall flat.

Written by Jimmy Burns, an accomplished journalist and author of other books, it is supposed to tell the tale of his late father. The book is chalk full of anecdotes and characters surrounding his father, too full in fact. The book jumps from character to character so much that the central theme, the story of Tom Burns, gets pushed aside at places and lost in the jumble. It is not clear for example why Burns joined the Ministry of Information in the first place. He just suddenly joined. What was going through his mind at the time? What other options did he have?

This book does not suffer from lack of information, it suffers from the plethora of information not edited properly. I'll admit I only read 1/4 of the book (93 out of 344 pages). But how far do I need to read to get out of the introduction and into a real storyline? ( )