Ben Macintyre

"The New York Times bestselling author of The Spy and the Traitor tells the thrilling true story of the most important female spy in history: an agent code-named "Sonya," who set the stage for the Cold War. In 1942, in a quiet village in the leafy English Cotswolds, a thin, elegant woman lived in a small cottage with her three children and her husband, who worked as a machinist nearby. Ursula Burton was friendly but reserved, and spoke English with...

From the acclaimed author of "Agent Zigzag" comes an extraordinary account of the most successful deception--and certainly the strangest--ever carried out in World War II, one that changed the prospects for an Allied victory. The purpose of the plan--code named Operation Mincemeat--was to deceive the Nazis into thinking that Allied forces were planning to attack southern Europe by way of Greece or Sardinia, rather than Sicily, as the Nazis had assumed,...

Eddie Chapman was a charming criminal, a con man, and a philanderer. He was also one of the most remarkable double agents Britain has ever produced. In 1941, after training as a German spy in occupied France, Chapman was parachuted into Britain with orders to blow up an airplane factory. Instead, he contacted MI5, the British Secret Service. For the next four years, he worked as a double agent, a British spy at the heart of the German Secret Service....

The incredible untold story of WWII's greatest secret fighting force, as told by our great modern master of wartime intrigue. Britain's Special Air Service--or SAS--was the brainchild of David Stirling, a young, gadabout aristocrat whose aimlessness in early life belied a remarkable strategic mind. Where most of his colleagues looked at a battlefield map of World War II's African theater and saw a protracted struggle with Rommel's desert forces, Stirling...

The official history of Ian Fleming and James Bond by the bestselling author of Operation Mincemeat

'Marvellously entertaining and informative' Spectator

'Thrilling' Sunday Times

'An entertaining mix of history, espionage, biography, and post-war sociology' Literary Review
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'I am going to...

Britain's Special Air Service, or SAS, was the brainchild of David Stirling, a young, gadabout aristocrat whose aimlessness in early life belied a remarkable strategic mind. Where most of his colleagues looked at a battlefield map of World War II's African theater and saw a protracted struggle with Rommel's desert forces, Stirling saw an opportunity: given a small number of elite, well-trained men, he could parachute behind enemy lines and sabotage...

In 1886 Elisabeth Nietzsche, sister of the famous philosopher, and friend of Richard Wagner, traveled with her husband, Bernhard Forster, and a select group of blond-haired, blue-eyed Germans to the remote Paraguayan wilderness to found an Aryan colony she called Nueva Germania. In Forgotten Fatherland Ben Macintyre tracks down the descendants of this early racial experiment, still living in Nueva Germania and breeding among themselves. Many have...

In Agent Sonya, author reveals the astonishing story behind the most important woman spy in history and the huge emotional cost that came with being a mother, a wife, and a secret agent at once.