Edition |
First Edition. |
Description |
xviii, 377 pages, [16] unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations, maps, portraits ; 25 cm |
Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references (pages [339]-354) and index. |
Contents |
Whirl -- Whore of the Orient -- Agent Ramsay -- When Sonya is Dancing -- The Spies Who Loved Her -- Sparrow -- Aboard the Conte Verde -- Our Woman in Manchuria -- Vagabond Life -- From Peking to Poland -- In for a Penny -- The Molehill -- A Marriage of Convenience -- The Baby Snatcher -- The Happy Time -- Barbarossa -- The Road to Hell -- Atomic Spies -- Milicent of MI5 -- Operation Hammer -- Rustle of Spring -- Great Rollright -- A Very Tough Nut -- Ruth Werner -- Afterword: the lives of others. |
Summary |
"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 a slight foreign accent. By all accounts, she seemed to be living a simple, unassuming life. Her neighbors in the village knew little about her. They didn't know that she was a high-ranking Soviet intelligence officer. They didn't know that her husband was also a spy, or that she was running powerful agents across Europe. Behind the facade of her picturesque life, Burton was a dedicated Communist, a Soviet colonel, and a veteran agent, gathering the scientific secrets that would enable the Soviet Union to build the bomb. This true-life spy story is a masterpiece about the woman code-named "Sonya." Over the course of her career, she was hunted by the Chinese, the Japanese, the Nazis, MI5, MI6, and the FBI-and she evaded them all. Her story reflects the great ideological clash of the twentieth century-between Communism, Fascism, and Western democracy-and casts new light on the spy battles and shifting allegiances of our own times. With unparalleled access to Sonya's diaries and correspondence and never-before-seen information on her clandestine activities, Ben Macintyre has conjured a page-turning history of a legendary secret agent, a woman who influenced the course of the Cold War and helped plunge the world into a decades-long standoff between nuclear superpowers."-- Provided by publisher. |
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In 1942, in a quiet village in the English Cotswolds, Ursula Burton was friendly but reserved, and spoke English with a slight foreign accent. Her unassuming life hid the fact that she was a high-ranking Soviet intelligence officer. Her husband was also a spy, and she was running powerful agents across Europe gathering the scientific secrets that would enable the Soviet Union to build the bomb. Macintyre tells the story of "Sonya," a woman who influenced the course of the Cold War and helped plunge the world into a decades-long standoff between nuclear superpowers. - adapted from jacket |
Subject |
Werner, Ruth, 1907-2000.
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Spies -- Soviet Union -- Biography.
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Spies -- Great Britain -- Biography.
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Espionage, Soviet -- Great Britain -- History -- 20th century.
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Nuclear weapons -- History -- 20th century.
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Soviet Union. Glavnoe razvedyvatelʹnoe upravlenie.
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Cold War.
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Women spies -- Soviet Union -- Biography.
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Spies -- Germany (East) -- Biography.
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HISTORY / Modern / 20th Century.
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POLITICAL SCIENCE / Political Ideologies / Communism, Post-Communism & Socialism.
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TRUE CRIME / Espionage.
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Werner, Ruth, 1907-2000. (OCoLC)fst01759700
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Soviet Union. Glavnoe razvedyvatelʹnoe upravlenie. (OCoLC)fst00585125
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Espionage, Soviet. (OCoLC)fst00915419
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Nuclear weapons. (OCoLC)fst01040971
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Spies. (OCoLC)fst01129772
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Women spies. (OCoLC)fst01178571
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Germany (East) (OCoLC)fst01210274
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Great Britain. (OCoLC)fst01204623
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Soviet Union. (OCoLC)fst01210281
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Cold War (1945-1989) (OCoLC)fst01754978
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Chronological Term |
1900-1999
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Genre/Form |
Biographies.
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Biographies. (OCoLC)fst01919896
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History. (OCoLC)fst01411628
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Biographies.
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Other Form: |
Online version: Macintyre, Ben, Agent Sonya First edition. New York : Crown, [2020] 9780593136317 (DLC) 2020019327 |
ISBN |
9780593136300 (hardcover) |
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0593136306 (hardcover) |
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