Have you ever wondered what it was like for the civilians of France during World War II? I have.  The Bicycle Spy gives us glimpses of the ordinary day-to-day life in France, in 1942, along with the focal story of secret resistance to the German occupation army.

Marcel discovers his parents, town bakers, have him delivering bread to his aunt and uncle with a written coded note inside it. Resistance?

The Tour de France has been canceled due to the war but the school boys still race their bikes with each other. At school, the new girl, Delphine, talks her way into Marcel and Arnaud’s bicycle race after school. She wins. Delphine and Marcel become bicycle riding buddies. Delphine brings a scrap book of the Tour de France to the old barn where she and Marcel meet after bicycle rides. Later, in the barn, Jewish and Resistance secrets are shared between the two of them after German soldiers have shown up at their school.

The plot thickens as Marcel’s family help Delphine’s Jewish family escape from France. As much as Marcel’s parents want to keep him safely in the dark from their Resistance work, it is not possible. Marcel delivers messages for them on his bicycle under stressful conditions : carrying notes past German check-points, unfamiliar routes, a time sensitive message that arrive too late, and his bicycle getting a flat tire. All the while Marcel keeps his tired legs pumping the bicycle pedals comparing his efforts to the ordeals of riding a bicycle in the Tour de France.

Then one day, Delphine and her family are gone. Months later, a letter from Portugal arrives. No message, just a picture of a girl riding a red bicycle with a cat in the basket torn from a magazine.

“While inspired by real events and historical characters, this is a work of fiction…”

It includes a time line of World War II in France, a short history of the Tour de France, and a glossary of terms – mostly French.