Stephanie Zvirin (Booklist, Feb. 1, 2007 (Vol. 103, No. 11))
It was her taciturn but beloved grandfather, William Hyde, who gave Tamar her strange name. But in 1995, when she was 15, he committed suicide, leaving her to wonder if she knew him at all. Later, when she opens the box of War II memorabilia that he left her, she's struck by the need to find out what it means, who he really was, and where she fits in. Tension mounts incrementally in an intricate wrapping of wartime drama and secrecy, in which Tamar finds her namesake and herself. Forming the backbone of the novel are intense, sometimes brutal events in a small Dutch town in Nazi-occupied Holland and the relationship between the girl's namesake, a member of the Dutch Resistance; Dart, a code operator assigned to help him; and Marijke, the love of his life. Peet's plot is tightly constructed, and striking, descriptive language, full of metaphor, grounds the story. Most of the characters are adults here, and to some readers, the Dutch history, though deftly woven through the story, will seem remote. But Peet's sturdy, emotionally resonant characterizations and dramatic backdrop will pull readers forward, as will the secret that gradually unravels. Despite foreshadowing, the outcome is still a stunner. Winner of Britain's 2005 Carnegie Medal, this powerful story will grow richer with each reading. Category: Books for Older Readers--Fiction. 2007, Candlewick, $17.99. Starred Review

Susie Wilde (Children's Literature)
Mal Peet’s Carnegie-winning, Tamar: A Novel of Espionage, Passion and Betrayal is two intertwined stories from different time periods led by characters named Tamar. Present-time Tamar is a fifteen-year-old girl who wants to understand the suicide of her grandfather. Historical Tamar is the code name of a British undercover agent sent to Nazi-controlled Holland during WWII to organize pockets of saboteurs. The latter Tamar is killed in the war and remembered by his fellow officer, Dart, who suggested the name Tamar for his granddaughter. The story draws on historical events that capture readers with image-laden writing. Characters and settings of long ago become immediate and dramatic with Peet’s cinematic detailing. Feelings are portrayed as strongly. Add suspense, mystery, and the theme of finding one’s self and it is no wonder this is a winning novel for young adults. 2007, Candlewick, $17.99. Ages 12 up.

CCBC (Cooperative Children's Book Center Choices 2008)
In 1944, two members of the Dutch resistance stationed in Britain for special training return to their homeland on a mission for the British Secret Service. Their code names are Tamar and Deet, and they are best friends. Tamar will be returning to the relative safety of a farm run buy a young woman name Marijke. They are in love, although he’s told no one, not even Deet, about their relationship. Deet will be staying in the nearby village. His undercover role is much more visible and dangerous, something he begins to resent as the strain takes a toll on his perspective. His occasional trips to the farm provide respite from the unyielding tension, and also a chance to spend time with Marijke, with whom he becomes infatuated. In 1994, a fifteen-year-old girl named Tamar is thrust into the middle of a mystery after her grandfather commits suicide. He left her a box full of crossword puzzles, maps, and coded messages, and she is convinced that unraveling their meaning will lead her to an answer about why he took his own life. She’d like to ask her grandmother, Marijke, but the older woman’s memories are too clouded, and her own father abandoned the family years before. Mal Peet’s intricately plotted novel of intrigue, betrayal, and love moves back and forth between the taut World War II narrative and teenage Tamar’s winding journey to arrive at an answer. Peet’s historical characters in particular are achingly human, displaying the best and worst of themselves under intense pressure during incredible times. His modern-day protagonist finds purpose in a search that reveals even more complex dimensions to characters whose lives and stories Tamar herself will continue. CCBC Category: Fiction for Young Adults. 2007, Candlewick Press, 424 pages, $17.99. Age 13 and older.

Kirkus (Kirkus Reviews, January 1, 2007 (Vol. 75, No. 1))
In 1944, Dart and Tamar, code names for two undercover operatives for Britain’s Special Operations Executive, parachute into Holland to reorganize the Dutch resistance movement. In 1955, a 15-year-old British girl named Tamar receives a box from her grandfather who has committed suicide. In it are clues to her grandfather’s past and her own identity, but she must go on a journey to make sense of the clues. In Peet’s Carnegie Medal–winning work, he tells the interwoven stories of Tamar the spy and Tamar the teenager in beautifully visualized episodes. Meticulously crafted scenes develop this long, complex and elegant work that is both a historical novel and a reflection on history—how a young girl’s life has been shaped by a past she never knew. Readers will be torn: They’ll want to slow down and savor the gorgeously detailed prose, but speed up to find out what happens next. Simply superb. (notes, acknowledgments) 2007, Candlewick, 432p, $17.99. Category: Fiction. Ages 13 up. Starred Review. © 2007 Kirkus Reviews/VNU eMedia, Inc. All rights reserved.

Claire Rosser (KLIATT Review, January 2007 (Vol. 41, No. 1))
This lengthy novel tells how the horrors of WW II terrorism (aka resistance fighting) affect three generations in one family. It reads like a thriller, with the action of wartime (winter, l945) interspersed with mysteries of identity in l995. The YA component is that the 15-year-old granddaughter, Tamar, who adores her grandfather, finds out when he commits suicide that his secrets from l945 ruined the life of his son, Tamar’s father. Uncovering the truth changes everything about her family. The resistance action takes place in Holland during the last winter of the war. Two young Dutchmen, trained and “run” by the British, are holed up in a remote area where they both fall in love with Marijke, the young woman at the farm where they are hiding. The spy code-named Tamar (after a river in Cornwall) is having an affair with Marijke and the other young man, code-named Dart, is obsessively jealous. Peet describes their incandescent lives so well that we understand how sleep and food deprivation, constant fear, and suffering and violence make them emotionally unbalanced, to say the least. The granddaughter Tamar is given a package after the death of her grandfather, which leads her on a quest to discover the truth about what happened in Holland so long ago. This is a demanding, carefully written story, with dreadful details of betrayal and violence. Winner of the 2006 Carnegie Medal. Category: Hardcover Fiction. KLIATT Codes: SA--Recommended for senior high school students, advanced students, and adults. 2007, Candlewick Press, 424p., $17.99. Ages 15 to adult.

C. Ellen Wickham (Library Media Connection, August/September 2007)
This novel slowly unfolds in alternating sections. One is about a spy and his best friend in 1945 Nazi-occupied Holland. The other, narrated by the spy's granddaughter, Tamar, takes place in 1995. When Tamar's granddad dies and leaves her a box of items from his days working with the Dutch Resistance, she goes on a quest to make sense of the artifacts. The chapters about Granddad vividly illustrate the atrocities committed by the Nazis. Introducing Tamar's grandparents early in the book seduces the reader into feeling that all will be well in the end, despite learning the details of their daily existence. The significance of events and loyalties surrounding Granddad and his best friend are fully developed and explored within the context of their espionage work. As this relationship unfolds, the book's dramatic conclusion is both shocking and satisfying-and it will haunt the reader. Although the ending isn't a tidy package, Tamar's Epilogue, dated 2005, ties up a few loose ends without appearing to be an author's afterthought. Peet's research is evident particularly in depictions of daily life, the tools of war, and spy techniques of the era. Even teens not normally interested in history will be unable to forget these characters. Highly Recommended. 2007, Candlewick Press, 432pp., $17.99 hc. Ages 15 to 18.

Elizabeth Bush (The Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books, May 2007 (Vol. 60, No. 9))
With Hitler struggling to retain his hold on Europe in 1944, two young men trained by the British are sent back into their native Netherlands to impose some order on the decentralized Dutch resistance, whose disorganized activities have been bringing horrendous Nazi reprisals to their countrymen. For the first man, code-named “Tamar,” the assignment brings unexpected joy since it means he will be billeted at the farm of his lover, Marijke; for his radio operator colleague, code-named “Dart,” it means being stranded with strangers in town under continual peril of discovery. Dart, his nerves stretched taut on fear and benzedrine, mistakes Marijke’s friendly concern for ardor, and when he learns of her affair with Tamar, he orchestrates an abortive resistance mission into a vehicle for revenge on his one-time friend. The rivalry resonates across generations when a granddaughter, named in honor of her war-hero grandfather, inherits a box full of clues that lead her to uncover a family skeleton insidious as that in M. E. Kerr’s Gentlehands. As a multigenerational story focusing on the Dutch resistance, this recalls Chambers’ Postcards from No Man’s Land (BCCB 9/02), but it’s a considerable original achievement as well. Peet deploys alternating narratives with exceptional skill, allowing the twentieth and twenty-first century players substantial stretches of page space to spin out their dramas in unnerving detail. There is cunning misdirection to satisfy mystery lovers, treachery to touch fans of tragic love stories, convincing recreation of resistance operations to engross historical-fiction buffs, and subtle underpinnings of metaphor to please readers who appreciate polished storytelling. An appended note comments briefly on Peet’s sources and on an historical incident recounted in his novel. Review Code: R* -- Recommended. A book of special distinction. (c) Copyright 2006, The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois. 2007, Candlewick, 424p., $17.99. Grades 9-12.

Horn Book (The Horn Book Guide, Fall 2007)
Readers might think they've wandered into Ken Follett territory. After a brief prologue set in 1979, the story turns to 1944, when two Dutch nationals turned British agents are parachuted into Nazi-occupied Holland. This is satisfying genre fiction; when introducing a YA slant things become a bit awkward. While occasionally purple, the writing is dramatic, and the Resistance activities are suspenseful. Category: Older Fiction. 2007, Candlewick, 426pp, 17.99. Ages 12 to 14. Rating: 4: Recommended, with minor flaws.

Dixie Bible (The Lorgnette - Heart of Texas Reviews (Vol. 20, No. 4))
This Carnegie Medal winner moves back and forth from World War II Nazi-occupied Holland to 1979 and 2005 to tell the story of two spies for the Allied Forces and the resistance fighters there. One of these spies’ code name is Tamar. In London in 1979, a child is born whose grandfather requests that she be named Tamar. The plot shifts through time and space to tell about the life of the child Tamar--and to tell a story of espionage, love, and the betrayal of one of the spies. When Tamar is a young woman, she opens a box left to her by her grandfather. The unraveling of the mystery contained in this box reveals a complex story of good versus evil, love and deception, and loyalty and betrayal. This is a wonderfully written book with complex characters. Peet has written a book that is one of those you just don’t want to put down. This book was written for young adults but should be recommended to adults as well. This book is for high school readers, mature middle school readers, and adults. Fiction. Grades 8 and up. 2007, Candlewick, 420p., $17.99. Ages 13 up.

Cindy Lombardo (VOYA, April 2007 (Vol. 30, No. 1))
With surgical precision, Peet explores universal themes of fear and suspicion, trust and compassion in this multilayered and complex story of the twisted relationship between two comrades in arms and their love for the same woman. As members of the resistance fighting in Nazi-occupied Holland during World War II, Tamar and Dart share days and nights of gut-wrenching fear and mind-numbing boredom, made endurable only by the seeming safety of Sanctuary Farm and the simple creature comforts it offers. In an alternate story line years later, a young girl named Tamar inherits a small box filled with clues and codes from her grandfather, who has fallen to his death from a balcony window. As she struggles to decipher the messages it contains, she unravels a dark tale of passion, evil, and tragedy that has the capacity to destroy or to reunite her own family. Skillfully interweaving the secrecy of the past with the uncertainty of modern day and moving fluidly across time, the author creates a lyrical tale of integrity and betrayal that takes place in both the past and the present. Filled with compelling and deeply disturbing images of the horrors of war, the feelings and questions raised by this winner of the prestigious Carnegie Medal will remain with the reader long after the last page has been turned. VOYA CODES: 5Q 3P S A/YA (Hard to imagine it being any better written; Will appeal with pushing; Senior High, defined as grades 10 to 12; Adult-marketed book recommended for Young Adults). 2007, Candlewick, 432p., $17.99. Ages 15 to Adult.