Agent Sonya News Today

Ben Macintyre on the psychology of spies and how to turn historical facts into riveting spy novels

Olivia Colman has made public her love for the Marvel Cinematic Universe and her desperate efforts to fit herself in the comics universe.During a press conference for MCUs Secret Invasion, the...

Ben Macintyre’s most recent book reveals hidden insights into World War II’s Colditz POW camp.

In Nathalia Holt’s group biography Wise Gals, five of the CIA’s pioneering female agents are brought in from the cold

It’s that time of year again: naming my favorite books of the year. Like last year, I did a lot of reading in 2021, at least in part because of a highly contagious virus that shut down so many things — and whose newly minted variant now threatens to...

It’s that time of year again: naming my favorite books of the year. Like last year, I did a lot of reading in 2021, at least in part because of a highly contagious virus that shut down so many things — and whose newly minted variant now threatens to...

Reading a good book is a great joy. And recommending a good book is almost as enjoyable. I’ve long been fascinated by books on espionage, and this contributed in no small part to me eventually joining the Dutch intelligence world, and lately, rejoining it in some fashion. If you have favorite books that should be on this page, please let me know on @PowerDNS_Bert or bert@hubertnet.nl! I’m especially looking for books written from different perspectives.

I won’t say too much about Ben Macintyre’s Agent Sonya as it’s been reviewed everywhere. I don ‘t think the Old Shanghai Hand or China Hand will find much to argue with on his details and his descriptions of Shanghai and Mukden (Shenyang) are all excellent. One word of warning – read the book, don’t listen to the audio book which Macintyre reads himself – it’s the most mangled Chinese ever and completely unlistenable to anyone familiar with the language. One thing i was particu...

Ursula Kuczynski, alias Ruth Werner, alias Agent Sonya, was a Red Army officer and an expert in radio communication, a saboteur, a first-rate spy and a successful writer. She achieved all of these things while raising a family, which was both a perfect alibi and a fateful trap. If her story is not well-known, it is because until now it has not been written about. Historian Ben Macintyre, the author of several books on the shadowy world of espionage and who has recently published the Spanish-lan...

Ben Macintyre is a British author, historian, reviewer and columnist for The Times.(Justine Stoddart) comments Writers and Company1:01:59Ben Macintyre tells the fascinating true story of the only woman to become a top Soviet spy Mrs. Len Beurton of Great Rollright, a tiny village in the Cotswolds, was an apparently ordinary housewife and mother of three, famous for her home-baked scones. In reality, she was Agent Sonya, a top Soviet operative, transmitting plans for the atomic bomb from an out...