Love, betrayal, and a secret war: the untold story of two elite agents, one Canadian, one British, who became one of the most decorated couples of WWII.

On opposite sides of the pond, Sonia Butt, an adventurous young British woman, and Guy d’Artois, a French-Canadian soldier and thunderstorm of a man, are preparing for war.

From different worlds, their lives first intersect during clandestine training to become agents with Winston Churchill’s secret army, the Special Operations Executive. As the world’s deadliest conflict to date unfolds, Sonia and Guy learn how to parachute into enemy territory, how to kill, blow up rail lines, and eventually . . . how to love each other. But not long after their hasty marriage, their love is tested by separation, by a titanic invasion—and by indiscretion.

Writing in vivid, heart-stopping prose, Ayed follows Sonia as she plunges into Nazi-occupied France and slinks into black market restaurants to throw off occupying Nazi forces, while at the same time participating in sabotage operations against them; and as Guy, in another corner of France, trains hundreds into a resistance army.

Reconstructed from hours of unpublished interviews and hundreds of archival and personal documents, the story Ayed tells is about the ravaging costs of war paid for disproportionately by the young. But more than anything, The War We Won Apart is a story about love: two secret agents who were supposed to land in enemy territory together, but were fated to fight the war apart.

In the fall of 2012, Nahlah Ayed was based in London and covering the world for the CBC. Her stories were filed from Riyadh and Tehran, Beirut and Baghdad, India, Pakistan, Kenya, and Haiti. For a decade, she lived in and covered the Middle East for the CBC. Her book, A Thousand Farewells: A Reporter's Journey from Refugee Camp to the Arab Spring, tells the story of her journey from Winnipeg to a refugee camp in Jordan, which formed the foundation of her life as a foreign correspondent. Days after she visited campus she was back in Egypt, reporting from Tahrir Square.

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“Writing so vivid you feel you are in the woods with the Resistance experiencing the seduction and horror of war. Brilliantly researched. Who knew elite women agents were parachuted behind enemy lines?” —Rosemary Sullivan, bestselling author of The Betrayal of Anne Frank: A Cold Case Investigation and Where the World Was: A Memoir

“A touching account of a remarkable young Canadian couple parachuted into occupied France to help the partisans: this is both a love story and a stirring tale about courage and selflessness all the more remarkable for having been kept so long a secret.” —Caroline Moorehead, bestselling author of A Train in Winter

“Behind enemy lines, Allied resistance fighters and secret agents chanced all to strike at the Nazi occupiers of France. Ayed recounts their stories with sympathy and skill, following the lives and legacy of those who sacrificed, loved, and lost during these fraught battles to liberate the oppressed.” —Tim Cook, bestselling author of The Fight for History: 75 Years of Forgetting, Remembering, and Remaking Canada’s Second World War

“This is a tale full of intrigue and suspense, but at its heart it's a love story, the kind that can only be forged within the intense heat of war. It's rendered even more poignant because the whole story is true, meticulously researched and crafted by one of Canada's finest journalists.” —Carol Off, award-winning journalist and author of All We Leave Behind

“This compelling account of two secret agents parachuted into France on the eve of D-Day is a veritable page turner. Young, energetic, and just married, Sonia and Guy d’Artois were forced to fight apart, and each performed courageously in the field. But their separation came at a price, and Nahlah Ayed brilliantly—and with great sensitivity—captures the demands this placed on their relationship, both then and for the rest of their lives. Thoroughly researched and well-informed, this is a human story that lingers long in the mind.” —David Stafford, author of Ten Days to D-Day and Secret Agent: The True Story of the Special Operations Executive