In 1945, near the end of World War II, a German plane crashes on a glacier in Iceland, oddly carrying both German and American high ranking officers. One of the German survivor's leaves the crash site with a suitcase handcuffed to his wrist, and is never seen again. Since that time U.S. military intelligence has attempted and failed several times to find that plane. Now over fifty years later they have found the plane and are willing to go to great lengths to keep it a secret. When two young Icelandic rescue team members, conducting training operations in the area, happen upon the excavation site, some very evil American military guys will go to great lengths to silence them and anyone who's been in contact with them. And so enters, Kristen, the sister of one of the rescue volunteers. Kristen receives a cryptic phone call from her brother which throws her into the mystery of what has happened to her brother and the secret behind Operation Napoleon.

Author Arnaldur Indridason is best know for his darkly atmospheric crime fiction series featuring Icelandic homicide inspector Erlendur Sveinsson, which I highly recommend, and Operation Napoleon has a lot of the same elements but it is much more of a fast-paced, page-turning thriller. This standalone story is Indridason's third novel, originally published in 1999 and has only recently been published in English.

Oh boy, this was a fun thriller with a great mix of espionage, history, and politics; I loved it. ~Mara