Sometimes they don’t see each other for months and even years. Even though they’re adversaries who eventually become enemies because of their countries, these two help each other out when they’re undercover.

The moment Adrian meets Justine, he’s smitten. The story goes back and forth over the years from 1794 France leading up to 1818 London. Justine may be dying and that’s where Adrian thinks back through the decades about his relationship with this daunting and incredible woman he loves. She passes out in a bloody heap on Adrian’s front steps and he takes her in and cares for her. She’s attacked and stabbed with a poisoned knife. Justine has come to London and opened her own shop. France and England are no longer enemies, all through there’s still mistrust on both sides. The Black Hawk begins twenty-five years after Adrian and Justine first meet. Justine eventually becomes a French Spy who goes by the Owl. Justine then meets up with Adrian and his mentor, Doyle (This is all explained in The Forbidden Rose, which you must read before The Black Hawk so you can understand who Justine and Adrian are). Justine escaped and did what she had to do survive in order to protect her four year old sister, Severine. At eleven, Justine was forced into prostitution by a man her parents’ trusted (Justine’s parents were killed). She is Justine DeCabrillac, a thirteen year old orphan girl who works for a Madame of a French brothel, but no longer as a whore. In The Forbidden Rose, Adrian meets his ultimate adversary. The one before this, The Forbidden Rose, was a prequel set during the French Revolution, which featured Hawker as a thirteen year old grubby street boy, but one who becomes a spy for England during the French Revolution and then during the Napoleonic Wars.

Giles, Head of the British Intelligence Service in 1818 Post-Napoleonic War England, has made a lasting impression based on the past three books from Joanna Bourne. The Black Hawk is one of my most anticipated reads this year because the hero, Hawker, aka Adrian Hawkhurst, former thief, master pickpocket from the rookies of St.

The Black Hawk by Joanna Bourne