When disgraced journalist Dolly Fontaine discovers that her mother, the seventies film star Gloria Fontaine, was a spy recruited by the British Intelligence Services to ensnare a ruthless Lusenkan dictator, past and present collide with dangerous consequences 

In the wake of a political scandal that shatters her high-flying career, journalist Dolly Fontaine seeks refuge at her childhood home, Genévrier, where her mysterious mother, the celebrated seventies film star, Gloria Fontaine, lived for decades. 

When Dolly discovers a dusty box of cassette tapes in the attic revealing Gloria’s most compelling, real-life role — a daring undercover mission as a British spy to her birth country of Lusenka — so begins a perilous journey involving diamonds, Cold War intrigue, and a merciless dictator. Can Gloria’s voice recordings, and an enigmatic, retired spook once known as Sunstar, help Dolly uncover the truth before a deadly adversary silences her forever?

Oh, Sugar spans two generations, taking the reader from 21st-century Cornwall to a fictional 1970s dictatorship.

Longlisted for the Santa Fé Writers' Project Literary Prize 2022

 

Endorsements:

‘A rollicking adventure story with a glorious, Bondesque glamour… Gloria Fontaine is the thinking woman’s James Bond. Left me totally wanting to be a spy!’ — Anne Hamilton, author of The Almost Truth

‘Oh, Sugar is at once a glamorous spy thriller and a complex exploration of maternal love, grief, and radical acceptance’— Laura Joyce, Author of The Luminol Reels

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‘Compelling… A taut, stylish, political thriller’ — Keiran Devaney, Literary Editor

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