But this is a more crowded, less intimate book. Macintyre’s far-reaching account of elite double agents, winds up detailing the war’s most complicated and successful ruse: the D-Day feat of deflecting German attention from the beaches of Normandy and successfully faking a different attack aimed at Calais, to the northeast. The more amazing “Operation Mincemeat” outlined the elaborate use of a floating corpse to spread disinformation. “Agent Zigzag” focused on Eddie Chapman, the onetime thief who turned his duplicity toward deceiving Germany on behalf of the Allied war effort. Each of his two most recent books, “Agent Zigzag” and “Operation Mincemeat,” has been suspensefully written and studded with exotic details. It's a gripping tale of loyalty, love, treachery, espionage, and the thin and shifting line between fidelity and betrayal.Ben Macintyre is the reigning champ when it comes to attention-grabbing World War II spy stories that are stranger than fiction. Based on recently declassified files, Agent Zigzag tells Chapman's full story for the first time. The problem for Chapman, his spymasters, and his lovers was to know where one persona ended and the other began. Inside the traitor was a man of loyalty inside the villain was a hero. Instead, he contacted M15, the British Secret service, and for the next four years, Chapman worked as a double agent, a lone British spy at the heart of the German Secret Service. In 1941, after training as German spy in occupied France, Chapman was parachuted into Britain with a revolver, a wireless, and a cyanide pill, with orders from the Abwehr to blow up an airplane factory. He was also one of the most remarkable double agents Britain has ever produced. ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: The New York Times Book Review, The Washington PostĮddie Chapman was a charming criminal, a con man, and a philanderer. ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: Entertainment Weekly

compellingly cinematic spy thriller with verve.'- Entertainment Weekly 'Ben Macintyre's rollicking, spellbinding Agent Zigzag blends the spy-versus-spy machinations of John le Carré with the high farce of Evelyn Waugh.'-William Grimes, The New York Times (Editors' Choice) We ship in recyclable American-made mailers. Title: Agent Zigzag: A True Story of Nazi Espionage, Love, and BetrayalĬlean, unmarked copy with some edge wear.

Agent zigzag book review