Entertaining for both its historical insights into WWII and its dramatic narrative.
A doozy of a dossier on Allen Dulles and his early days spying during World War II.
As recounted by former Wall Street Journal correspondent Miller (The President and the Assassin: McKinley, Terror, and Empire at the Dawn of the American Century, 2011), before orchestrating coups in places like Iran, Guatemala, and Cuba, Dulles was a dashing and dedicated operative for the Office of Strategic Services (the forerunner of the CIA) charged with helping to keep tabs on Hitler and his Nazi henchmen. Although officially neutral, the Swiss city from which Dulles operated, Bern, was replete with double agents, moles, and spies of every stripe. It wasn’t long before Dulles learned about the powerful resistance groups within Germany and the German military itself who were bent on assassinating Hitler. One such character was the intriguing Hans Bernd Gisevius, a member of the German military intelligence who hated Nazis but also had a book he desperately wanted published. There was also American heiress Mary Bancroft, a globe-trotting socialite with an exquisite taste for danger: “Believing as I did that Jean was a Turk, I fancied myself in some mysterious kind of danger. A delicious thought.” The trio formed an incongruous undercover operation sharing secrets and sex. Dulles never missed a beat as he drew closer to the Valkyrie plot to blow up Hitler inside the “Wolf’s Lair” at Rastenburg, East Prussia. However, the future head of the CIA had more on his mind than knocking out Hitler or sleeping with Bancroft. Convinced that Stalin and the communists wanted to carve up Europe to their liking after the war ended, Dulles fought hard to warn the U.S. government of the coming Red Menace and craft the response that would shape America’s future over the next 70 years. To augment his rapid-fire spy story, Miller also supplies a timeline, a list of principal characters, and a brief closing section regarding the fates of the primary characters.
Entertaining for both its historical insights into WWII and its dramatic narrative.Pub Date: March 7, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4516-9338-6
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2017
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
PERSPECTIVES
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
