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The Probability of Everything
By Sarah Everett. 2023
“One of the best books I have read this year (maybe ever).” —Colby Sharp, Nerdy Book ClubNPR Books We Love…
2023 | Publishers Weekly Best of 2023 | Winner of the Governor General's Literary Awards for Young People's LiteratureA heart-wrenching middle grade debut about Kemi, an aspiring scientist who loves statistics and facts, as she navigates grief and loss at a moment when life as she knows it changes forever.Eleven-year-old Kemi Carter loves scientific facts, specifically probability. It's how she understands the world and her place in it. Kemi knows her odds of being born were 1 in 5.5 trillion and that the odds of her having the best family ever were even lower. Yet somehow, Kemi lucked out.But everything Kemi thought she knew changes when she sees an asteroid hover in the sky, casting a purple haze over her world. Amplus-68 has an 84.7% chance of colliding with earth in four days, and with that collision, Kemi’s life as she knows it will end.But over the course of the four days, even facts don’t feel true to Kemi anymore. The new town she moved to that was supposed to be “better for her family” isn’t very welcoming. And Amplus-68 is taking over her life, but others are still going to school and eating at their favorite diner like nothing has changed. Is Kemi the only one who feels like the world is ending?With the days numbered, Kemi decides to put together a time capsule that will capture her family’s truth: how creative her mother is, how inquisitive her little sister can be, and how much Kemi's whole world revolves around her father. But no time capsule can change the truth behind all of it, that Kemi must face the most inevitable and hardest part of life: saying goodbye."My heart hurt as I raced through the last chapters of this unique book that shines a light on family, friends, grief, and love." —Lisa Yee, author of Maizy Chen's Last ChanceNormal Broken: The Grief Companion for When It's Time to Heal but You're Not Sure You Want To
By Kelly Cervantes. 2023
None of us make it through life without experiencing loss that leaves us feeling broken. That&’s what makes grief so…
normal.In Normal Broken, Kelly Cervantes isn&’t trying to tell you what to do, how to feel, or the right way to heal. She&’s also not flinging sunny thoughts, vibes, and prayers at you. After losing her daughter to epilepsy, she knows that grief is many things. It&’s weird. It sucks. It&’s all-encompassing. Something everyone will have to deal with. But never linear. Just as what we are grieving varies, so do our journeys to process it.Normal Broken was born out of this desire to meet people where they are in their grief journeys, to lend a hand, or maybe to just sit in the dark with them. To acknowledge your brokenness and to feel broken together—never pressured to &“move on&” or &“think positive.&”With chapters that can be read in any order, Normal Broken is divided into &“moments&” of grief that will allow you to choose what you need at any given time—such as:When you&’re not sure if you want to heal When your greatest fear is socializingWhen you&’re facing anniversaries and other meaningful datesWhen you&’re ready to be okay Kelly also shares stories from her ongoing journey, along with advice she wishes someone had given her, and simple exercises to help you reflect on where you are. Normal Broken is designed to serve as a companion through your own grief journey, whether you are mourning the loss of a child, a friend, a family member, or anyone special in your life.More Than We Expected: Five Years With a Remarkable Child
By James G. Robinson. 2023
&“No matter how much I enjoyed parenthood, I found myself having to accept its fundamental truth: that nothing ever turns…
out quite as you&’d expect.&”It was a journey that most parents would hope to avoid: a son born with a congenital heart defect, a fateful decision to take a family trip abroad, and an emergency hospitalization that left them stranded on the other side of the world with no obvious way home. Despite these difficult circumstances, More Than We Expected is not a tragedy. Instead, this memoir offers valuable lessons about the privilege of parenthood and the practice of medicine: the mysterious ways in which the body forms and grows, giving life; how we find the faith to live with our decisions, even if the consequences are beyond our control; and a family&’s extraordinary capacity—when something goes wrong—to compensate and heal. More Than We Expected is a story of finding strength in the most unexpected places. Our children have a special ability to reveal the goodness in the world—their eyes a window to a life full of wonder. Like them, this book is a vivid reminder of what it means to be human—a miraculous, inexplicable gift, however fleeting.American Afterlives: Reinventing Death in the Twenty-First Century
By Shannon Lee Dawdy. 2021
A mesmerizing trip across America to investigate the changing face of death in contemporary lifeDeath in the United States is…
undergoing a quiet revolution. You can have your body frozen, dissected, composted, dissolved, or tanned. Your family can incorporate your remains into jewelry, shotgun shells, paperweights, and artwork. Cremations have more than doubled, and DIY home funerals and green burials are on the rise. American Afterlives is Shannon Lee Dawdy’s lyrical and compassionate account of changing death practices in America as people face their own mortality and search for a different kind of afterlife.As an anthropologist and archaeologist, Dawdy knows that how a society treats its dead yields powerful clues about its beliefs and values. As someone who has experienced loss herself, she knows there is no way to tell this story without also reexamining her own views about death and dying. In this meditative and gently humorous book, Dawdy embarks on a transformative journey across the United States, talking to funeral directors, death-care entrepreneurs, designers, cemetery owners, death doulas, and ordinary people from all walks of life. What she discovers is that, by reinventing death, Americans are reworking their ideas about personhood, ritual, and connection across generations. She also confronts the seeming contradiction that American death is becoming at the same time more materialistic and more spiritual.Written in conjunction with a documentary film project, American Afterlives features images by cinematographer Daniel Zox that provide their own testament to our rapidly changing attitudes toward death and the afterlife.We're Going Home: A True Story of Life and Death
By Cynthia Thayer. 2023
They were an unlikely pair: a “fast and frantic” woman and a steady, “pickin’ at it” man. And even though…
both had been raised in cities and knew nothing about farming, Bill and Cynthia Thayer moved to Maine, started an organic farm, and made it work for more than forty years. Then a mysterious disaster strikes and Bill is found lying in the road. In We’re Going Home, Cynthia relates the aftermath of the accident, interspersed with recollections of her life with her beloved “Farmer Bill,” from their first meeting to their final goodbye—and her life beyond.There Is No Blue
By Martha Baillie. 2023
THE GLOBE AND MAIL: BOOKS TO READ IN FALL 2023Martha Baillie’s richly layered response to her mother’s passing, her father's…
life, and her sister’s suicide is an exploration of how the body, the rooms we inhabit, and our languages offer the psyche a home, if only for a time. Three essays, three deaths. The first is the death of the author’s mother, a protracted disappearance, leaving space for thoughtfulness and ritual: the washing of her body, the making of a death mask. The second considers the author’s father, his remoteness, his charm, a lacuna at the centre of the family even before his death, earlier than her mother’s. And then, the shocking death of the author’s sister, a visual artist and writer living with a diagnosis of schizophrenia, who writes three reasons to die on her bedroom wall and then takes her life."Martha Baillie’s novels are thrillingly, joyously singular, that rare combination of sui generis and just plain generous. That There Is No Blue, her memoir, is all of those things too, is no surprise; still, she has gone somewhere extraordinary. This triptych of essays, which exquisitely unfolds the “disobedient tale” of the lives and deaths of her mother, her father, and her sister, is a meditation on the mystery and wonder of grief and art making and home and memory itself. It made me think of kintsugi, the Japanese art of repair, in which the mending is not hidden but featured and beautifully illuminated. Baillie’s variety of attention, carved out of language, is tenderness, is love." – Maud Casey, author of City of Incurable Women"This is a stunning memoir, intense and meticulous in its observations of family life. Baillie subtly interrogates and conveys the devastating mistranslations that take place in childhood, the antagonism and porousness of siblings, and the tragedy of schizophrenia as it unfolds. I couldn’t put it down." – Dr. Lisa Appignanesi, author of Mad, Bad and Sad and Everyday Madness"Exquisite." – Souvankham Thammavongsa, author of How to Pronounce Knife"I am grateful for this profound meditation on family and loss.” – Charlie Kaufman, filmmaker"This strange, unsettling memoir of outer life and inner life and their bizarre twining captures the author’s identity by way of her mother’s death, her sister’s failing battle with mental illness, and the mysterious figure of her father. It combines anguished guilt, deep tenderness, and bemused affection in highly evocative, often disturbing prose. Its brave honesty is amplified by a persistent lyricism; its undercurrent of fear is uplifted by a surprising, resilient hopefulness. It is both a plea for exoneration and an act of exoneration, an authentic meditation on the terrible difficulty of being human." – Andrew Solomon, author of The Noonday DemonYo confieso: 45 años de espía
By Fernando Rueda, Mikel Lejarza. 2019
1974: Mikel Lejarza es captado por el servicio secreto para infiltrarse en ETA con el alias de El Lobo. 2019:…
Con otro nombre, Mikel Lejarza sigue trabajando para el CNI. Esta es su vida. Esta es la historia. Mikel Lejarza ha guardado silencio sobre su vida hasta este momento. Ahora ha decidido desvelar en primera persona en el libro Yo confiesotodo lo que ha hecho y todo por lo que ha pasado. Ha escrito, con la ayuda del periodista Fernando Rueda, unas memorias duras, sinceras, en las que por primera vez cuenta todo lo que ha sido su vida, sin olvidarse de los momentos amargos, de su éxitos e, incluso, de aquellas actuaciones de las que no está especialmente satisfecho. Yo confieso es un libro humano en el que Mikel ha querido que Mamen, su mujer, confidente y compañera en algunas de sus misiones, aporte su visión personal sobre los hechos, recordando los momentos vividos en una relación complicada, como no podía ser otra que la vivida por una mujer que ha compartido 40 años con el agente más antiguo que tienen los servicios secretos españoles. La crítica ha dicho...«405 páginas que te dejan sin aliento. Estas confesiones de El Lobo son imprescindibles para conocer esa parte que ha permanecido oculta de nuestra historia reciente.»Julia Navarro «Un trabajo espléndido.»Nieves Herrero «La genteencontrará muchas informaciones que le gustará, le apasionarán, en este libro.»Bruno Cardeñosa, La rosa de los vientos, Onda Cero «Lejarza y Rueda cuentan todo lo que le ha pasado al agente de los servicios secretos españoles desde aquella primera misión que supuso un enorme golpe para la banda terrorista.»eldiario.es «Un estremecedor relato en el que aparece por primera vez Mamen, la mujer de El Lobo, que narra una historia humana y personal sobre los sufrimientos que entraña estar durante 40 años con alguien que vive en la clandestinidad.»El Español «Duro, inmisericorde, Mikel Lejarza revela en Yo Confieso, a través de la pluma de Fernando Rueda, lo que jamás había contado.»El ojo crítico«Detrás de ese libro, claramente, hay alguien que maneja fenomenalmente la pluma.»Adolfo Arjona, COPE «Yo confieso es, además de unas memorias, el resultado de un excelente trabajo editorial.»Jot Down «Un libro valiente, estremecedor, avalado por un héroe que cuenta de primera manomucho de lo que realmente pasó dentro de la organización terrorista que contribuyó a derrotar.»El Periódico de Aragón «Hay libros que enganchan más que una serie, se convierten en adición deseada y buscada. Puede pasar un tiempo pero volvemos a su llamada. El género del confidente informador es el de los observadores en la vida que vienen a poner luz en el otro lado de la luna.»Pilar Falcón, El Correo GallegoSecretos de confesión: 50 años de la Operación Lobo
By Fernando Rueda, Mikel Lejarza. 2022
La explosiva continuación de Yo confieso, las memorias de Mikel Lejarza, El Lobo. Secretos de confesión son las narraciones de…
la vida de Mikel Lejarza desde un punto de vista diferente, dando voz a personas que habían permanecido en la sombra, personas con las que ha compartido partes trascendentales de su vida. Jefes, colaboradores o familia que nunca habían hablado sobre su relación con él, personas que han hablado desde una perspectiva íntima y personal de unos hechos y sentimientos distintos a los expresados por Mikel.En 2023 se cumplen cincuenta años del inicio de la operación Lobo, cincuenta años del mayor éxito en la lucha contra ETA, cincuenta años del ingreso de Mikel Lejarza en el servicio de inteligencia. Esta segunda entrega de las trascendentales memorias de El Lobo también incluye historias novedosas y sorprendentes que no había querido desvelar y un capítulo extenso llamado «Charlas de café: vamos a contar verdades», en el que Mikel compartirá sus sentimientos, sus anécdotas, sus errores y aciertos, los temas que menos le gustan... en una conversación con Fernando desde lo más profundo de su corazón. El sonido de las palabras de Mikel, el agente negro más antiguo y de mayor prestigio en la historia de España, arrojará luz sobre esas cuestiones que nadie se había atrevido a preguntarle. El libro está marcado por la leyenda creada por ETA de que cualquiera de sus miembros siempre llevaba una bala reservada para matarlo. Una venganza que 50 años después no han podido ejecutar. La crítica ha dicho...«Si les gustan las historias de espías, traiciones, misterios, etc., este es su libro. La lectura de este libro no dejará indiferente a nadie.»Julia Navarro, escritora y periodista «Cuando Fernando Rueda habla con Mikel Lejarza, en esas conversaciones cruzadas, se acreditan muchas de las cosas que han ocurrido en el país, entre alcantarillas, por las azoteas, pero siempre al margen del primer plano dela actualidad, y que nos son develadas gracias a los varios libros ya que Fernando ha publicado.»Carlos Herrera, Herrera en COPE «Secretos de confesión y Yo confieso son dos obras imprescindibles para conocer los entresijos de uno de los episodios más trascendentales y terribles de la reciente historia de España.»R. Pérez Barredo, Diario de Burgos«Un libro imprescindible. Escrito desde el rigor periodístico, escrito desde el periodismo de investigación, y, sobre todo, con la participación de un testigo excepcional de la lucha antiterrorista, Mikel Lejarza.»David Felipe Arranz, Cautivos del mal, Periodista Digital «Incluye historias novedosas y sorprendentes que no había querido desvelar, dando voz a personas que habían permanecido en la sombra, personas con las que ha compartido partes trascendentales de su vida.»El Confidencial Digital«Unas nuevas narraciones de la vida de Lejarza desde un punto de vista más personal.» «El libro da voz a personas que habían permanecido en la sombra, personas con las que el espía compartió partes trascendentales.»Iñigo Aduriz, eldiarioesVoices of the Codebreakers: Personal Accounts of the Secret Heroes of World War II
By Michael Paterson. 2018
Alongside the open conflict of World War II there were other, hidden wars - the wars of communication, in which…
success depended on a flow of concealed and closely guarded information.Smuggled written messages, secretly transmitted wireless signals, or months of eavesdropping on radio traffic meant operatives could discover in advance what the enemy intended to do. This information was passed on to those who commanded the armies, the fleets and the bomber formations, as well as to the other secret agents throughout the world who were desperately trying to infiltrate enemy lines. Vital information that turned the tide of battle in North African desert and on the Pacific Ocean proved to have been obtained by the time-consuming and unglamorous work of cryptanalysts who deciphered the enemy's coded messages, and coded those for the Allies.From the stuffy huts of Bletchley Park to the battles in the Mediterranean, the French and Dutch Resistance movements and the unkempt radio operatives in Burma, the rarely-seen, outstanding stories collected here reveal the true extent of the 'secret war'.The ongoing need for secrecy for decades after the war meant that the outstanding achievements of wartime cryptanalysts could not be properly recognised.With vivid first-hand accounts and illuminating historical research, VOICES OF THE CODEBREAKERS reveals and finally celebrates the extraordinary accomplishments of these ordinary men and women.Childhood & Death in Victorian England
By Sarah Seaton. 2017
A vivid and graphic survey of the casualties of childhood during the Victorian Era through detailed and never-before-seen firsthand accounts.…
Take a fascinating journey into the real lives of Victorian children—how they lived, worked, played, and far too often, died before reaching adulthood. These true accounts, many of which had been hidden for more than a century, reveal the hardship and cruel conditions endured by young people living through the tumult of the Industrial Revolution. Here are the lives of a traveling fair child, an apprentice at sea, and a young trapper, as well as the children of prostitutes, servant girls, debutantes, and married women, all unified in the tragedy of early death. Drawing on actual cases of infanticide and baby farming, historian Sarah Seaton uncovers the dismal realities of the Victorian Era&’s unwed mothers, whose shame at being pregnant drove them to carry out horrendous crimes. With the introduction of the New Poor Law in 1834, the future for some poor children changed—but not for the better. Yet it was the tragic loss of these many young lives that lead to essential reforms, and eventually to today&’s more enlightened views on childhood.The Florist's Daughter
By Patricia Hampl. 2007
This New York Times Notable memoir of a middle-class, middle-America family is a &“beautiful bouquet of a book&” (Entertainment Weekly).…
They say &“a daughter is a daughter all her life,&” and no statement could be truer for Patricia Hampl. Born to a Czech father—an artistic florist—and a wary Irish mother, Hampl experienced a childhood in St. Paul, Minnesota, that couldn&’t have been more normal, the perfect example of a twentieth century middle-class, middle-American upbringing. But as she faces the death of her mother, Hampl reflects on the struggles her parents went through to provide that normal, boring existence, and her own struggles with fulfilling the role of dutiful daughter as she grew through the postwar years to the turbulent sixties and couldn&’t help wanting to rebel against the notion of a &“relentlessly modest life.&” Named a Chicago Tribune Best Book of the Year, The Florist&’s Daughter is Hampl&’s most extraordinary work to date—a &“quietly stunning&” reminiscence of a Midwestern girlhood, and a reflection on what it means to be a daughter (People).Routledge Handbook of Disinformation and National Security
By Rubén Arcos, Irena Chiru, Cristina Ivan. 2023
This interdisciplinary Handbook provides an in-depth analysis of the complex security phenomenon of disinformation and offers a toolkit to counter…
such tactics. Disinformation used to propagate false, inexact or out of context information is today a frequently used tool of political manipulation and information warfare, both online and offline. This Handbook evidences a historical thread of continuing practices and modus operandi in overt state propaganda and covert information operations. Further, it attempts to unveil current methods used by propaganda actors, the inherent vulnerabilities they exploit in the fabric of democratic societies and, last but not least, to highlight current practices in countering disinformation and building resilient audiences. The Handbook is divided into six thematic sections. The first part provides a set of theoretical approaches to hostile influencing, disinformation and covert information operations. The second part looks at disinformation and propaganda in historical perspective offering case study analysis of disinformation, and the third focuses on providing understanding of the contemporary challenges posed by disinformation and hostile influencing. The fourth part examines information and communication practices used for countering disinformation and building resilience. The fifth part analyses specific regional experiences in countering and deterring disinformation, as well as international policy responses from transnational institutions and security practitioners. Finally, the sixth part offers a practical toolkit for practitioners to counter disinformation and hostile influencing. This handbook will be of much interest to students of national security, propaganda studies, media and communications studies, intelligence studies and International Relations in general.Anything for My Child: Making Impossible Decisions for Medically Complex Children
By Stephanie Nimmo. 2024
Every parent wants the same thing: for their child to enjoy a long and fulfilling life. But what happens when…
things don't go according to plan? What happens when parents have to become advocates for their child's healthcare needs? Who decides what is in a child's 'best interests'?Stephanie Nimmo faced these questions first-hand when her daughter, Daisy, was diagnosed with a life-limiting condition as a baby. Seen through the lens of Stephanie's own experiences, this sensitive book delves into the complex world of medical ethics and paediatric palliative care. From recognising tipping points to the importance of building relationships with palliative care teams well before crisis, this book explores how medical professionals can better support families throughout their child's care.Interviews with clinicians and snapshots from the lives of patients' families provide insight into the realities of life on both sides of the hospital bed. Compassionate explanations of the conflicting pressures in the hospital system foster understanding and help medical professionals and families work together.Drone Warrior: An Elite Soldier's Inside Account of the Hunt for America's Most Dangerous Enemies
By Christopher Stewart, Brett Velicovich. 2017
“A must read for anyone who wants to understand the new American way of war.” — General Michael V. Hayden, former Director…
of the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency A former special operations member takes us inside America’s covert drone war in this headline-making, never-before-told account for fans of Zero Dark Thirty and Lone Survivor, told by a Pulitzer Prize-winning Wall Street Journal writer and filled with eye-opening and sure to be controversial details.For nearly a decade Brett Velicovich was at the center of America’s new warfare: using unmanned aerial vehicles—drones—to take down the world’s deadliest terrorists across the globe. One of an elite handful in the entire military with the authority to select targets and issue death orders, he worked in concert with the full human and technological network of American intelligence—assets, analysts, spies, informants—and the military’s elite operatives, to stalk, capture, and eliminate high value targets in al-Qaeda and ISIS.In this remarkable book, co-written with journalist Christopher S. Stewart, Velicovich offers unprecedented perspective on the remarkably complex nature of drone operations and the rigorous and wrenching decisions behind them. In intimate gripping detail, he shares insider, action-packed stories of the most coordinated, advanced, and secret missions that neutralized terrorists, preserved the lives of US and international warriors across the globe, and saved countless innocents in the hottest conflict zones today.Drone Warrior also chronicles the US military’s evolution in the past decade and the technology driving it. Velicovich considers the future it foretells, and speaks candidly on the physical and psychological toll it exacts, including the impact on his own life. He reminds us that while these machines can kill, they can also be used productively to improve and preserve life, including protecting endangered species, work he is engaged in today.Joining warfare classics such as American Sniper, Lone Survivor, and No Easy Day,Drone Warrior is the definitive account of our nation’s capacity and capability for war in the modern age.Eyes In The Sky: The Secret Rise of Gorgon Stare and How It Will Watch Us All
By Arthur Michel. 2018
The fascinating history and unnerving future of high-tech aerial surveillance, from its secret military origins to its growing use on…
American citizensEyes in the Sky is the authoritative account of how the Pentagon secretly developed a godlike surveillance system for monitoring America's enemies overseas, and how it is now being used to watch us in our own backyards. Whereas a regular aerial camera can only capture a small patch of ground at any given time, this system—and its most powerful iteration, Gorgon Stare—allow operators to track thousands of moving targets at once, both forwards and backwards in time, across whole city-sized areas. When fused with big-data analysis techniques, this network can be used to watch everything simultaneously, and perhaps even predict attacks before they happen. In battle, Gorgon Stare and other systems like it have saved countless lives, but when this technology is deployed over American cities—as it already has been, extensively and largely in secret—it has the potential to become the most nightmarishly powerful visual surveillance system ever built. While it may well solve serious crimes and even help ease the traffic along your morning commute, it could also enable far more sinister and dangerous intrusions into our lives. This is closed-circuit television on steroids. Facebook in the heavens. Drawing on extensive access within the Pentagon and in the companies and government labs that developed these devices, Eyes in the Sky reveals how a top-secret team of mad scientists brought Gorgon Stare into existence, how it has come to pose an unprecedented threat to our privacy and freedom, and how we might still capitalize on its great promise while avoiding its many perils.When We Were the Kennedys: A Memoir from Mexico, Maine
By Monica Wood. 2012
Winner of the Sarton Memoir Award. &“[A] marvel of storytelling, layered and rich . . . an account of one…
family&’s grief, love, and resilience&” (Maine Sunday Telegram). Mexico, Maine, 1963: The Wood family is much like its close, Catholic, immigrant neighbors, all dependent on the fathers&’ wages from the Oxford Paper Company. But when Dad suddenly dies on his way to work, Mum and the four deeply connected Wood girls are set adrift. When We Were the Kennedys is the story of how a family, a town, and then a nation mourns and finds the strength to move on. &“Intimate but expansive . . . A tender memoir of a very different time.&”—O, The Oprah Magazine &“Every few years, a memoir comes along that revitalizes the form . . . With generous, precise, and unsentimental prose, Monica Wood brilliantly achieves this . . . When We Were the Kennedys is a deeply moving gem!&”—Andre Dubus III, #1 New York Times bestselling author &“On her own terms, wry and empathetic, Wood locates the melodies in the aftershock of sudden loss.&”—The Boston Globe &“This is an extraordinarily moving book, so carefully and artfully realized, about loss and life and love. Monica Wood displays all her superb novelistic skills in this breathtaking, evocative new memoir. Wow.&”—Ken Burns, filmmaker &“A gorgeous, gripping memoir. I don&’t know that I&’ve ever pulled so hard for a family. When We Were the Kennedys captures a shimmering mill-town world on the edge of oblivion, in a voice that brims with hope, feeling, and wonder. The book humbles and soars.&”—Mike Paterniti, New York Times bestselling authorThe Angel: The Egyptian Spy Who Saved Israel
By Uri Bar-Joseph. 2016
A NETFLIX ORIGINAL MOVIETHE BEST INTELLIGENCE BOOK for 2017 by The American Association of Former Intelligence OfficersA gripping feat of…
reportage that exposes—for the first time in English—the sensational life and mysterious death of Ashraf Marwan, an Egyptian senior official who spied for Israel, offering new insight into the turbulent modern history of the Middle East.As the son-in-law of Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser and a close advisor to his successor, Anwar Sadat, Ashraf Marwan had access to the deepest secrets of the country’s government. But Marwan himself had a secret: He was a spy for the Mossad, Israel’s intelligence service. Under the codename “The Angel,” Marwan turned Egypt into an open book for the Israeli intelligence services—and, by alerting the Mossad in advance of the joint Egyptian-Syrian attack on Yom Kippur, saved Israel from a devastating defeat.Drawing on meticulous research and interviews with many key participants, Uri Bar Joseph pieces together Marwan’s story. In the process, he sheds new light on this volatile time in modern Egyptian and Middle Eastern history, culminating in 2011’s Arab Spring. The Angel also chronicles the discord within the Israeli government that brought down Prime Minister Golda Meir.However, this nail-biting narrative doesn’t end with Israel’s victory in the Yom Kippur War. Marwan eluded Egypt’s ruthless secret services for many years, but then somebody talked. Five years later, in 2007, his body was found in the garden of his London apartment building. Police suspected he had been thrown from his fifth-floor balcony, and thanks to explosive new evidence, Bar-Joseph can finally reveal who, how, and why.Dark Forces: The Truth About What Happened in Benghazi
By Kenneth Timmerman. 2014
The New York Times bestselling author of Shadow Warriors investigates the tragedy of Benghazi to answer the questions: what really…
happened—and why?We know the Obama administration’s story, of a demonstration caused by an Internet movie that went out of control. But what actually did happen in Benghazi on the night of September 11, 2012?Dark Forces is the story of clandestine arms deliveries by the United States and its allies to Libya that wound up in the hands of Islamist guerrillas. It’s a story of a romantic diplomat, in love with the Middle East and with a mystical version of Islam. It’s a story of bald-faced lies, heroic acts, and the deepest corruption.But Dark Forces is not only a retelling of events. It puts those events into the larger context of Obama administration policy toward the Middle East. It will examine the administration’s record of systematically supporting Muslim Brotherhood and extremist groups in their efforts to overthrow pro-U.S. autocrats in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya.It shows how President Obama’s obsessive outreach to the leadership of the Islamic Republic of Iran led the Iranian regime to dismiss him as a weak, ineffective leader who would not fight back. And it shows why and how this deadly combination cost the lives of four Americans on Sept. 11, 2012.The Puzzle Palace: A Report on NSA, America's Most Secret Agency
By James Bamford. 1981
The first book ever written on the National Security Agency from the New York Times bestselling author of Body of Secrets and The Shadow Factory.…
In this groundbreaking, award-winning book, James Bamford traces the NSA&’s origins, details its inner workings, and explores its far-flung operations. He describes the city of fifty thousand people and nearly twenty buildings that is the Fort Meade headquarters of the NSA—where there are close to a dozen underground acres of computers, where a significant part of the world&’s communications are monitored, and where reports from a number of super-sophisticated satellite eavesdropping systems are analyzed. He also gives a detailed account of NSA&’s complex network of listening posts—both in the United States and throughout much of the rest of the world. When a Soviet general picks up his car telephone to call headquarters, when a New York businessman wires his branch in London, when a Chinese trade official makes an overseas call, when the British Admiralty urgently wants to know the plans and movements of Argentina&’s fleet in the South Atlantic—all of these messages become NSA targets. James Bamford&’s illuminating book reveals how NSA&’s mission of Signals Intelligence (SIGINT) has made the human espionage agent almost a romantic figure of the past. Winner Best Investigative Book of the Year Award from Investigative Reporters & Editors &“The Puzzle Palace has the feel of an artifact, the darkly revealing kind. Though published during the Reagan years, the book is coolly subversive and powerfully prescient.&”—The New Yorker &“Mr. Bamford has emerged with everything except the combination to the director&’s safe.&”—The New York Times Book ReviewAt the Center of the Storm: My Years at the CIA
By George Tenet, Bill Harlow. 2007
In the whirlwind of accusations and recriminations that emerged in the wake of 9/11 and the Iraq war, one man's…
vital testimony has been conspicuously absent. Candid and gripping, At the Center of the Storm recounts George Tenet's time at the Central Intelligence Agency, a revealing look at the inner workings of the most important intelligence organization in the world during the most challenging times in recent history. With unparalleled access to both the highest echelons of government and raw intelligence from the field, Tenet illuminates the CIA's painstaking attempts to prepare the country against new and deadly threats, disentangles the interlocking events that led to 9/11, and offers explosive new information on the deliberations and strategies that culminated in the U.S. invasion of Iraq.Beginning with his appointment as Director of Central Intelligence in 1997, Tenet unfolds the momentous events that led to 9/11 as he saw and experienced them: his declaration of war on al-Qa'ida; the CIA's covert operations inside Afghanistan; the worldwide operational plan to fight terrorists; his warnings of imminent attacks against American interests to White House officials in the summer of 2001; and the plan for a coordinated and devastating counterattack against al-Qa'ida laid down just six days after the attacks. Tenet's compelling narrative then turns to the war in Iraq as he provides dramatic insight and background on the run-up to the invasion, including a firsthand account of the fallout from the inclusion of "sixteen words" in the president's 2003 State of the Union address, which claimed that Saddam Hussein had sought to purchase uranium from Africa; the true context of Tenet's own now-famous "slam dunk" comment regarding Saddam's WMD program; and the CIA's critical role in an administration predisposed to take the country to war. In doing so, he sets the record straight about CIA operations and shows readers that the truth is more complex than suggested in other versions of recent history offered thus far. Through it all, Tenet paints an unflinching self-portrait of a man caught between the warring forces of the administration's decision-making process, the reams of frightening intelligence pouring in from around the world, and his own conscience. In At the Center of the Storm, George Tenet draws on his unmatched experience within the opaque mirrors of intelligence and provides crucial information previously undisclosed to offer a moving, revelatory profile of both a man and a nation in times of crisis.