The Olive Tree: Branches

By Hannah Howe

Young nurse, Heini Hopkins, travels through France en route to Spain where she hopes to discover the fate of her boyfriend, Deiniol Price, an International Brigades volunteer. She also intends to nurse the Loyalist soldiers as they fight the fascists in the Spanish Civil War.

Taking a similar, though unconnected journey, novelist Naomi Parker travels to Spain where she intends to write propaganda pieces on behalf of the fascists. She also intends to meet up with the man of her dreams, dashing bomber pilot, Prince Nicolas Esteban.

While Naomi samples the high life in Spain, Heini is thrust on to the frontline where she tends an endless line of wounded soldiers.

The Loyalists train with wooden sticks instead of guns while the fascists bomb them from their German aeroplanes. Against such overwhelming odds, how can Deiniol survive? Furthermore, how can Heini remain true to herself amidst the chaos? While searching for answers, she learns the truth about herself, along with painful lessons about love and war.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Goylake Publishing
• Release date: Nov 25, 2020
• ISBN: 9781838011871

Hannah Howe

Hannah Howe is the bestselling author of the Sam Smith Mystery Series (Sam's Song, book one in the series, has reached number one on the amazon.com private detective chart on seven separate occasions and the number one position in Australia). Hannah lives in the picturesque county of Glamorgan with her partner and their two children. She has a university degree and a background in psychology, which she uses as a basis for her novels.Hannah began her writing career at school when her teacher asked her to write the school play. She has been writing ever since. When not writing or researching Hannah enjoys reading, genealogy, music, chess and classic black and white movies. She has a deep knowledge of nineteenth and twentieth century popular culture and is a keen student of the private detective novel and its history.Hannah's books are available in print, as audio books and eBooks from all major retailers: Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Google Play, Kobo, iBooks, etc. For more details please visit https://hannah-howe.comThe Sam Smith Mystery Series in book order:Sam's SongLove and BulletsThe Big ChillRipperThe Hermit of HisaryaSecrets and LiesFamily HonourSins of the FatherSmoke and MirrorsStardustMind GamesDigging in the DirtA Parcel of RoguesBostonThe Devil and Ms DevlinSnow in AugustLooking for Rosanna MeeStormy WeatherDamagedEve’s War: Heroines of SOEOperation ZigzagOperation LocksmithOperation BroadswordOperation TreasureOperation SherlockOperation CameoOperation RoseOperation WatchmakerOperation OverlordOperation Jedburgh (to follow)Operation Butterfly (to follow)Operation Liberty (to follow)The Golden Age of HollywoodTula: A 1920s Novel (to follow)The Olive Tree: A Spanish Civil War SagaRootsBranchesLeavesFruitFlowersThe Ann's War Mystery Series in book order:BetrayalInvasionBlackmailEscapeVictoryStandalone NovelsSaving Grace: A Victorian MysteryColette: A Schoolteacher’s War (to follow)What readers have been saying about the Sam Smith Mystery Series and Hannah Howe..."Hannah Howe is a very talented writer.""A gem of a read.""Sam Smith is the most interesting female sleuth in detective fiction. She leaves all the others standing.""Hannah Howe's writing style reminds you of the Grandmasters of private detective fiction - Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler and Robert B. Parker.""Sam is an endearing character. Her assessments of some of the people she encounters will make you laugh at her wicked mind. At other times, you'll cry at the pain she's suffered.""Sam is the kind of non-assuming heroine that I couldn't help but love.""Sam's Song was a wonderful find and a thoroughly engaging read. The first book in the Sam Smith mystery series, this book starts off as a winner!""Sam is an interesting and very believable character.""Gripping and believable at the same time, very well written.""Sam is a great heroine who challenges stereotypes.""Hannah Howe is a fabulous writer.""I can't wait to read the next in the series!""The Big Chill is light reading, but packs powerful messages.""This series just gets better and better.""What makes this book stand well above the rest of detective thrillers is the attention to the little details that makes everything so real.""Sam is a rounded and very real character.""Howe is an author to watch, able to change the tone from light hearted to more thoughtful, making this an easy and yet very rewarding read. Cracking!""Fabulous book by a fabulous author-I highly recommended this series!""Howe writes her characters with depth and makes them very engaging.""I loved the easy conversational style the author used throughout. Some of the colourful ways that the main character expressed herself actually made me laugh!""I loved Hannah Howe's writing style -- poignant one moment, terrifying the next, funny the next moment. I would be on the edge of my seat praying Sam wouldn't get hurt, and then she'd say a one-liner or think something funny, and I'd chuckle and catch my breath. Love it!""Sam's Song is no lightweight suspense book. Howe deals with drugs, spousal abuse, child abuse, and more. While the topics she writes about are heavy, Howe does a fantastic job of giving the reader the brutal truth while showing us there is still good in life and hope for better days to come."

Book preview

THE OLIVE TREE

BRANCHES

THE OLIVE TREE

BRANCHES

Hannah Howe

Goylake Publishing

Copyright © 2020 Hannah Howe

All rights reserved.

The moral right of the author has been asserted.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, or stored in a retrieval system, in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Goylake Publishing, Iscoed, 16A Meadow Street, North Cornelly, Bridgend, Glamorgan. CF33 4LL

Print ISBN: 978-1-8380118-8-8

eBook ISBN: 978-1-8380118-7-1

Printed and bound in Britain by Imprint Digital, Exeter, EX5 5HY

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organisations, places and events are either a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is purely coincidental.

The Olive Tree

available in print, as eBooks and audio books

Roots

Branches

Leaves

Fruit

Flowers

Ann’s War available in print, as eBooks and audio books

Betrayal

Invasion

Blackmail

Escape

Victory

Eve’s War available in print, as eBooks and audio books

Operation Zigzag

Operation Locksmith

Operation Broadsword

Operation Treasure

Operation Sherlock

Operation Cameo

Operation Rose

Operation Watchmaker

Operation Overlord

Operation Jedburgh

Operation Butterfly

Operation Liberty

The Sam Smith Mystery Series

available in print, as eBooks and audio books

Sam’s Song

Love and Bullets

The Big Chill

Ripper

The Hermit of Hisarya

Secrets and Lies

Family Honour

Sins of the Father

Smoke and Mirrors

Stardust

Mind Games

Digging in the Dirt

A Parcel of Rogues

Boston

The Devil and Ms Devlin

Snow in August

Looking for Rosanna Mee

Stormy Weather

Stand-alone Novel

Saving Grace

To my family, with love

You are history. You are legend. You are the heroic example of democracy’s solidarity and universality...we shall not forget you; and, when the olive tree of peace is in flower, entwined with the victory laurels of the Republic of Spain – come back. – La Pasionaria, 1938.

Chapter One

June 1937

For Heini Hopkins, the journey represented a series of firsts: the first time she had travelled by boat train; the first time she had visited Calais; the first time she had set eyes on Paris and the first time she had witnessed anything as grand as the Great Exhibition.

Born and brought up in a humble Welsh village, life for Heini had revolved around her community and her nursing. Now, aged twenty-one, she was branching out following her boyfriend, International Brigades volunteer Deiniol Price, to Spain.

Heini’s contact in London had stated that a man would meet her at the Great Exhibition, in front of Picasso’s Guernica. There, he would offer further instructions. Carrying her handbag and two heavy suitcases crammed with her belongings and medical supplies, she made her way through the exhibition towards Picasso’s painting, which depicted the bombing of Guernica, an atrocity that had claimed the lives of many innocent men, women and children.

The bewildering cornucopia of two hundred and forty pavilions dotted along the banks of the River Seine overwhelmed Heini. There was so much to see, so much to take in, so many new sights, sounds and smells to stimulate the senses.

Against such a colourful, kaleidoscopic backdrop, the dullness of the British display offered a sense of familiarity and relief with its tweeds, pipes, walking sticks, golf balls, marmalade jars and bowler hats. The Great Exhibition was about the future, yet the British display suggested that the gentry still lived in the nineteenth century.

Heini placed her suitcases upon the ground and stared at Picasso’s painting. A large work, eleven feet tall and twenty-five feet broad, Guernica depicted the suffering of people and animals. Amidst the violence and chaos women screamed, trapped by the tortuous flames.

In shades of grey, black and white, the surrealist painting startled Heini. She thought about Deiniol and the fate that awaited him. She thought about herself and her commitment to the Cause. Why was she doing this, leaving her Welsh life behind and travelling to Spain? For her love of Deiniol,