The War We Won Apart: The Untold Story of Two Elite Agents Who Became One of the Most Decorated Couples of WWII

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Reconstructed from hours of unpublished interviews and hundreds of archival and personal documents, the story Ayed tells is about the ravaging costs of war paid for disproportionately by the young.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.

NAHLAH AYED is a writer, a broadcaster, and currently producer and presenter of longtime radio documentary program Ideas on CBC Radio. For two decades, Ayed was a prolific foreign correspondent, working in hot zones around the world, based first in the Middle East, and later, for nearly a decade in London, UK. Her body of work spans the globe--from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, to Russia’s annexation of Crimea, to Brexit and Europe’s refugee crisis. Over the years, she has garnered numerous national and international awards, including the London-based Foreign Press Association’s Story of the Year award for her work in India. Her bestselling first book, A Thousand Farewells, was a finalist for the 2012 Governor General’s Literary Awards.