Book
The spy's son : the true story of the highest-ranking CIA officer ever convicted of espionage and the son he trained to spy for Russia
Record details
- ISBN: 9780802123589 (hardcover)
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Physical Description:
print
365 p. : ill. (chiefly col.) ; 24 cm. - Publisher: New York : Atlantic Monthly Press, 2015.
Content descriptions
| Bibliography, etc. Note: | Includes bibliographical references and index. |
| Formatted Contents Note: | Prologue: Suspected spies in chains -- Hola Nancy -- First CIA tour, Manila Station -- "Batman" switches teams -- A new counterspy collaboration -- We have another Aldrich Ames -- Spy vs. spy under Landley's roof -- FBI takedown at Dulles -- Forsaken all allegiance to his homeland -- A new cellblock celebrity -- A fall into blackness -- The Russian Consulate, San Francisco -- A spy named "George" -- Faith, prosperity, and the door -- CIA detects codes, espionage, again -- Keep looking through your new eyes -- FBI offers a mulligan -- Inmate 738520 -- Eighteen: A spy swap and reparations -- Epilogue: The last asset. |
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Available copies
- 1 of 1 copy available at BC Interlibrary Connect. (Show)
- 1 of 1 copy available at Sechelt/Gibsons.
- 1 of 1 copy available at Sechelt Public Library. (Show preferred library)
Holds
- 0 current holds with 1 total copy.
| Location | Call Number / Copy Notes | Barcode | Shelving Location | Holdable? | Status | Due Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sechelt Public Library | 327.1273 DENS (Text) | 3326000352498 | Nonfiction | Volume hold | Available | - |
- BookPage Reviews : BookPage Reviews 2015 May
The family who spies togetherIn his early Cold War novels, John le Carré referred to something called "Moscow Rules": the tradecraft used by spies in a hostile city when they had to be super-cautious to avoid getting caught. If you want to learn the 21st-century equivalent of those rules, The Spy's Son is a great place to startâalthough in real life, they don't always work as smoothly as in fiction.
Author Bryan Denson, an experienced journalist, leads us step-by-step through an extraordinary espionage case that stretched, in two phases, from the mid-1990s to 2011. In phase one, Jim Nicholson, a rising star in the CIA, sold his agency's secrets to the Russians to get himself out of a financial jam. He was caught and sent to prison. Then, in a remarkable twist in 2006, Jim, still imprisoned, recruited his son Nathan to sell more secrets to the Russians.
Nathan was a somewhat adrift young man in his 20s who loved his father too much to fathom how he was being manipulated into treachery. With words of paternal care and religious faith, Jim lured his son into his scheme. The Russians were happy to play along; luckily for U.S. national security, the FBI caught on to Nathan as fast as it had to his father.
The book's strength is its wonderful detail. We follow Nathan as he meets his grizzled Russian spymaster "George" in San Francisco, Lima, Mexico City and Malta; we track the FBI agents on his trail. The feds wouldn't let Jim talk to Denson, but we end the book with a strong sense of the two-time spy's plans and motives. Clever and narcissistic, Jim did love his son. But he had no compunction about turning him into his "last asset."
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This article was originally published in the May 2015 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.
Copyright 2012 BookPage Reviews. - Kirkus Reviews : Kirkus Reviews 2015 February #2
The uncommon family business of selling information to Russia proves exciting, lucrative and remarkably misguided.An adolescent Nathan Nicholson didn't believe the FBI agents who came to his door and announced that his father had been arrested for espionage. Though he had suspicions that his father might be a spy, he thought the charges of selling secrets to Russia must have been a setup. Nathan grew up idolizing his dad, and even when Jim admitted to Nathan and his siblings that the charges were true, Nathan had a hard time believing it. Convinced there was some other explanation, he remained certain of Jim's good character and strove to please the father he only saw in prison visiting rooms. After an injury resulting in an honorable discharge from the Army, Nathan went into an emotional tailspin, leaning on his beloved father for support. In need of money and, more importantly, a sense of direction, Nathan agreed to make contact with Russia on his dad's behalf, asking for m oney and passing on information from Jim in return. Oregonian investigative reporter Denson, winner of the George Polk Award, traced Nathan's and Jim's stories all the way to the beginning, and he spends a good deal of the narrative setting the scene for Nathan's eventual willingness to betray the country he loved at his father's behest. The intricate portrait of Nicholson family life makes the father-son crime feel inevitable without ever coming off as dull. Denson puts his reporting chops to good use, packing the book with information but never overwhelming readers and maintaining tension, interest and momentum. Despite a confusingâbut thankfully shortâdigression into a 2010 spy swap between Russia and the U.S., the author proves himself more than capable of taking the leap from long-form newspaper stories to books. Other than spies, this book has little in common with spy thrillers, but it's just as captivating. Copyright Kirkus 2015 Kirkus/BPI Communications.All rights reserved.
