Social Spy

1988 South Africa teeters on the edge of a state of emergency. Seventeen-year-old Bradley Steyn crosses Pretoria’s Strijdom Square and walks straight into a massacre. Barend Strydom, the notorious white supremacist ‘Wit Wolf’, is mowing down black bystanders relaxing in the square during their lunch break. Bradley cradles a dying man in his arms and, later, with reports of eight dead and sixteen seriously injured, he is brought face to face with the insanity of the nation.

Kristie Macrakis combines a storyteller's sense of drama with a historian's respect for evidence in this pause-resisting history of intrigue and espionage, love and war, magic and secrecy. From the piazzas of ancient Rome to the spy capitals of the Cold War, Macrakis' global history reveals the drama and importance of invisible ink. From Ovid's advice to use milk for illicit love notes, to al-Qaeda's hidden instructions in pornographic movies, this book presents stories of secret messaging that chart its evolution in sophistication and its impact on history.

During the civil rights movement, the state of Mississippi created an elaborate spy network. Its mission was to preserve segregation by any means necessary—including voter interference, sponsorship of white supremacy groups, and even murder.

Walter Eekhaut, a veteran of the Belgian police force who has a problem with authority, is dispatched to Amsterdam to aid the Dutch security service in investigating the activities of a well-connected Russian oligarch, with ties to Putin. Some of the Russian's business is legitimate, but some may well not be. In Amsterdam, Eekhaut is seconded to Chief Superintendent Alexandra Dewaal and her team, and begins to learn about the city's shady underside.

In 1971, Rod Barton applied for a junior scientist role in the Australian Department of Defence. Little did he know what it entailed: As the Cold War intensified, Barton was inducted into the murky world of espionage. This is an extraordinary behind-the-scenes account of a world marked by risk, secrecy and individual acts of courage. The Life of a Spy will introduce you to a man of principle in a time of chaos, and take you to the frontlines of politics and war.

In September 2011, sheriff’s deputies in Iowa encountered three ethnic Chinese men near a field where a farmer was growing corn seed under contract with Monsanto. What began as a simple trespassing inquiry mushroomed into a two-year FBI operation in which investigators bugged the men’s rental cars, used a warrant intended for foreign terrorists and spies, and flew surveillance planes over corn country - all in the name of protecting trade secrets of corporate giants Monsanto and DuPont Pioneer.

This candid and darkly witty memoir recounts an exhilarating life - and a few close brushes with death. With remarkable sangfroid and a humorist's eye for absurdity, H. K. Roy describes his many strange and risky exploits in his long career with the CIA. Whether he was pursuing Soviet and Cuban spies, running "denied area" operations in Eastern Europe, hunting Bosnian War criminals, or providing actionable intelligence to US government and coalition forces in Iraq, Roy usually found himself at the right place at the right time.

In 1965, following his mother's death, Infante returns to Cuba from Brussels, where he is employed as a cultural attaché at the Cuban embassy. When a few days later his permission to return to Europe is revoked, Infante begins a period of suspicion, uncertainty, and disillusion. Unable to leave the country, denied access to party officials, yet still receiving checks for his work in Belgium, Infante discovers the reality of Cuba under Fidel Castro.

From 1941 to 1944, Bignor Manor, a farmhouse in Sussex, provided board and lodging for men and women of the French Resistance before they were flown by moonlight into occupied France. Barbara Bertram, whose husband was a conducting officer for the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6), became hostess for these daring agents and their pilots during their brief stopovers in their house.

London. December 1981. The IRA is on the attack, a cold war is being waged, another war is just over the horizon, and Stephen Donaldson spends his days listening. When he first joined the Institute, he expected to encounter glamorous, high-risk espionage. Instead he gets the tape-recorded conversations of ancient Communists and ineffectual revolutionaries - until the day he is assigned a new case: the ultra-secret PHOENIX, a suspected internal leak.

Nocturno de la Democracia Mexicana son tres libros en uno. Un análisis ágil y novedoso sobre los lastres que nos impone la historia; una puntual recapitulación de nuestra aún inacabada transición a la democracia, y una advertencia sobre las pulsiones autoritarias del nuevo gobierno.

Her father was a man cloaked in mystery, a man of contradiction. James M. Eichelberger was a writer, philosopher, decorated WWII intelligence officer, CIA Agent, and oil industry consultant who died a penniless alcoholic. After he left her family in Beirut, Lebanon when she was six years old, Anne E. Tazewell only saw her father seven times before his death in 1989.

Kiara, traditionally a loner, doesn't hesitate to say exactly what's on her mind. But she's found good friends among the Spyglass Sisterhood members who appreciate her keen observations and incredible smarts. When a fellow classmate starts to get bullied online, Kiara is determined not only to find the perpetrator(s), but also to bring them to justice. To do that, she'll need help from her friends and from the Sisterhood's magical spyglass to gather evidence and put the pieces together.

Spies on Trial brings the listener fast-paced stories of foreign spies engaged in daring deeds of sleuthing that undoubtedly have more than their fair share of intriguing moments. But nowhere is this suspense more intense than inside the courtroom, where the drama of intense covert activities is fully unfurled, offering fascinating glimpses into this vast and nefarious underground world of international espionage.

On his first day in alias, John Braddock encountered a car crash, possible surveillance and a source who threatened to kill his boss. Fortunately, he was trained for all that. He was trained to think through the risks. And to structure them. And to take the risks, when the time was right.You see through his eyes how to take risks when the stakes are high and lives are on the line. You see the impact of small choices and situational awareness. You see the structure of risks, the importance of understanding necessary conditions, and having fallbacks.

Bertie Bradshaw never set out to become a spy. He never imagined traipsing around war-torn London, solving ciphers, practicing surveillance, and searching for a traitor to the Allied forces. He certainly never expected that a strong-willed American girl named Eleanor would play Watson to his Holmes (or Holmes to his Watson, depending on who you ask). But when a young woman goes missing, leaving behind a coded notebook, Bertie is determined to solve the mystery.

Sonny’s House of Spies is a deeply affecting story of a family whose closely guarded secrets are beginning to cause harm. In 1950s Alabama, the Bradshaw children are perfecting their spycraft. Ever since Mama kicked Daddy out of the house, 13-year-old Sonny has sensed that someone is watching them, someone unseen. So one Friday, Sonny sneaks out of town on his bike to search for his father. He doesn’t know if he’ll find him, but one thing’s for sure - he needs to know the truth.

In the contemporary information landscape, individuals are exposed to an overwhelming volume of content delivered through digital and traditional media channels. This saturation does not merely inform—it distorts, desensitizes, and contributes to a subtle yet pervasive psychological condition: collective learned helplessness.

Dickie Metcalfe was not your typical secret agent, but he was larger than life in more ways than one. Unlike many other agents who were part of the Double Cross System during the Second World War, he did not defect; nor was he blackmailed into becoming a spy. Instead, using his father's connection with Sir Vernon Kell, the first director of MI5, Metcalfe volunteered his services. Recently cashiered from his infantry regiment, he had an ulterior motive.

Ten-year-old Jada Sly is an artist and a spy-in-training. When she isn't studying the art from her idols like Jackie Ormes, the first-known African American cartoonist, she's chronicling her spy training and other observations in her art journal. Back home in New York City, after living in France for five years, Jada is ready to embark on her first and greatest spy adventure yet. She plans to scour New York City in search of her missing mother, even though everyone thinks her mom died in a plane crash. Except Jada, who is certain her mom was a spy, too.