Secret Agent: The True Story of the Special Operations Executive by David Stafford (BBC Worldwide, £16.99)

IN 1940, Britain stood alone as Europe lay under the heel of the Nazi jackboot. As the British stared invasion in the face, a group of unconventional warriors planned a new form of warfare.

With a brief from Winston Churchill to "set Europe ablaze" a top-secret agency was given the dangerous task of co-ordinating subversions and sabotage against the enemy by all means necessary.

They used disguise, deception, bribery, explosives, guerrilla warfare and assassination. The Special Operations Executive had taken the war to the enemy.

This book, accompanying the BBC television series, tells the story of the men and women who risked their lives to fight this secret war. It was a life of living by wits and reflexes and a degree of reliance on ingenious survival devices. Capture meant interrogation, torture and certain death.

Some of the devices and weapons used by the SoE were indeed remarkable. The exploding rat - the skin of the rodent stuffed with explosives and left in coal piles at railway stations - is one such example.

But this book is not only about Heath Robinson contraptions such as this. It is more concerned with the courage and tenacity of a select band of men and women who risked everything in order to hasten the return of democracy and justice to a troubled continent.

John Mansell-Read