Code Name Verity Themes

Code Name Verity tells the story of Maddie, a British female pilot during World War II, and her best friend Julie, who works as a spy and is captured by the Nazis in the fictional town of Ormaie, France. The book is told in two parts: the first is written by Julie, who has made a deal with her Nazi captors and is sharing British military secrets with them—in the form of the…

Though captured British spy Julie is ostensibly giving her Nazi captors British military secrets, her written account of British airfields, aircraft, and secret squadrons is also the story of how women’s involvement in World War II. Julie’s account focuses on her best friend, Maddie, who becomes a pilot just before World War II begins. As time goes on, and as male pilots are injured or die in action, Maddie moves up the ranks and…

As Maddie and Julie become involved in the British war effort during World War II, both women have to decide what it means to be brave and courageous in their respective lines of work. Maddie, for instance, doesn’t think of herself as brave when she’s tasked with flying damaged planes (without flight instruments) around England. But she finds her friend Julie’s work as a spy and interrogator terrifying, as Julie constantly has to assume different…

Though Code Name Verity is fictional, it’s ostensibly written by its two main characters, best friends Julie and Maddie. Julie (a British spy) writes the first part of the novel for the Ormaie Gestapo (Nazi secret police) while she’s imprisoned in their headquarters, and Maddie (a military pilot and Julie’s best friend) writes the second part of the book in her pilot’s notebook when she’s stranded in France. For Julie, writing her story is…