
Double Cross
The True Story of the D-Day Spies
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed

Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Buy for $18.00
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
John Lee
-
By:
-
Ben Macintyre
About this listen
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The “superb [and] intensely readable” (The Washington Post) untold story of one of the greatest deceptions of World War II and the extraordinary spies who achieved it—from the bestselling author of Prisoners of the Castle
“Not since Ian Fleming and John le Carré has a spy writer so captivated readers.”—The Hollywood Reporter
On June 6, 1944, 150,000 Allied troops landed on the beaches of Normandy and suffered an astonishingly low rate of casualties. A stunning military achievement, it was also a masterpiece of trickery. Operation Fortitude, which protected and enabled the invasion, and the Double Cross system, which specialized in turning German spies into double agents, tricked the Nazis into believing that the Allied attacks would come in Calais and Norway rather than Normandy. It was the most sophisticated and successful deception operation ever carried out, ensuring Allied victory at the most pivotal moment in the war.
This epic event has never before been told from the perspective of the key individuals in the Double Cross system, until now. These include its director (a brilliant, urbane intelligence officer), a colorful assortment of MI5 handlers (as well as their counterparts in Nazi intelligence), and the five spies who formed Double Cross’s nucleus: a dashing Serbian playboy, a Polish fighter-pilot, a bisexual Peruvian party girl, a deeply eccentric Spaniard, and a volatile Frenchwoman. Together they made up one of the oddest and most brilliant military units ever assembled.
With the same depth of research, eye for the absurd, and masterful storytelling that have made Ben Macintyre an international bestseller, Double Cross is a captivating narrative of the spies who wove a web so intricate it ensnared Hitler’s army and carried thousands of D-Day troops across the Channel in safety.
Listeners also enjoyed...
-
Operation Mincemeat
- How a Dead Man and a Bizarre Plan Fooled the Nazis and Assured an Allied Victory
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 11 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ben Macintyre’s Agent Zigzag was hailed as “rollicking, spellbinding” (New York Times), “wildly improbable but entirely true” (Entertainment Weekly), and, quite simply, “the best book ever written” (Boston Globe). In his new book, Operation Mincemeat, he tells an extraordinary story that will delight his legions of fans. In 1943, from a windowless basement office in London, two brilliant intelligence officers conceived a plan that was both simple and complicated - Operation Mincemeat.
-
-
Better than the movie
- By Jack M on 06-23-10
By: Ben Macintyre
-
Prisoners of the Castle
- An Epic Story of Survival and Escape from Colditz, the Nazis' Fortress Prison
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: Ben Macintyre
- Length: 13 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this gripping narrative, Ben Macintyre tackles one of the most famous prison stories in history and makes it utterly his own. During World War II, the German army used the towering Colditz Castle to hold the most defiant Allied prisoners. For four years, these prisoners of the castle tested its walls and its guards with ingenious escape attempts that would become legend. But as Macintyre shows, the story of Colditz was about much more than escape.
-
-
Another chapter of history brought to life by a master
- By Steve on 09-28-22
By: Ben Macintyre
-
Agent Zigzag
- A True Story of Nazi Espionage, Love, and Betrayal
- By: Ben MacIntyre
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 10 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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. Inside the traitor was a man of loyalty; inside the villain was a hero. The problem for Chapman, his spymasters, and his lovers was to know where one persona ended and the other began.
-
-
What a great character
- By Michael on 02-24-09
By: Ben MacIntyre
-
Rogue Heroes
- The History of the SAS, Britain's Secret Special Forces Unit That Sabotaged the Nazis and Changed the Nature of War
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: Ben Macintyre
- Length: 13 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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 their airplanes and war matériel.
-
-
Those Who Dared, Won!
- By Matthew on 10-07-16
By: Ben Macintyre
-
A Spy Among Friends
- Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 11 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Who was Kim Philby? Those closest to him—like his fellow MI6 officer and best friend since childhood, Nicholas Elliot, and the CIA’s head of counterintelligence, James Jesus Angleton—knew him as a loyal confidant and an unshakeable patriot. Philby was a brilliant and charming man who rose to head Britain’s counterintelligence against the Soviet Union. Together with Elliott and Angleton he stood on the front lines of the Cold War, holding Communism at bay. But he was secretly betraying them both: He was working for the Russians the entire time.
-
-
The narrator is incorrectly identified.
- By Greenlake DD on 07-30-14
By: Ben Macintyre
-
The Billion Dollar Spy
- A True Story of Cold War Espionage and Betrayal
- By: David E. Hoffman
- Narrated by: Dan Woren
- Length: 11 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
While getting into his car on the evening of February 16, 1978, the chief of the CIA's Moscow station was handed an envelope by an unknown Russian. Its contents stunned the Americans: details of top-secret Soviet research and development in military technology that was totally unknown to the United States.
-
-
Compelling as historical thriller, character study
- By Mr. Pointy on 08-25-15
By: David E. Hoffman
-
Operation Mincemeat
- How a Dead Man and a Bizarre Plan Fooled the Nazis and Assured an Allied Victory
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 11 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ben Macintyre’s Agent Zigzag was hailed as “rollicking, spellbinding” (New York Times), “wildly improbable but entirely true” (Entertainment Weekly), and, quite simply, “the best book ever written” (Boston Globe). In his new book, Operation Mincemeat, he tells an extraordinary story that will delight his legions of fans. In 1943, from a windowless basement office in London, two brilliant intelligence officers conceived a plan that was both simple and complicated - Operation Mincemeat.
-
-
Better than the movie
- By Jack M on 06-23-10
By: Ben Macintyre
-
Prisoners of the Castle
- An Epic Story of Survival and Escape from Colditz, the Nazis' Fortress Prison
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: Ben Macintyre
- Length: 13 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this gripping narrative, Ben Macintyre tackles one of the most famous prison stories in history and makes it utterly his own. During World War II, the German army used the towering Colditz Castle to hold the most defiant Allied prisoners. For four years, these prisoners of the castle tested its walls and its guards with ingenious escape attempts that would become legend. But as Macintyre shows, the story of Colditz was about much more than escape.
-
-
Another chapter of history brought to life by a master
- By Steve on 09-28-22
By: Ben Macintyre
-
Agent Zigzag
- A True Story of Nazi Espionage, Love, and Betrayal
- By: Ben MacIntyre
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 10 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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. Inside the traitor was a man of loyalty; inside the villain was a hero. The problem for Chapman, his spymasters, and his lovers was to know where one persona ended and the other began.
-
-
What a great character
- By Michael on 02-24-09
By: Ben MacIntyre
-
Rogue Heroes
- The History of the SAS, Britain's Secret Special Forces Unit That Sabotaged the Nazis and Changed the Nature of War
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: Ben Macintyre
- Length: 13 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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 their airplanes and war matériel.
-
-
Those Who Dared, Won!
- By Matthew on 10-07-16
By: Ben Macintyre
-
A Spy Among Friends
- Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 11 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Who was Kim Philby? Those closest to him—like his fellow MI6 officer and best friend since childhood, Nicholas Elliot, and the CIA’s head of counterintelligence, James Jesus Angleton—knew him as a loyal confidant and an unshakeable patriot. Philby was a brilliant and charming man who rose to head Britain’s counterintelligence against the Soviet Union. Together with Elliott and Angleton he stood on the front lines of the Cold War, holding Communism at bay. But he was secretly betraying them both: He was working for the Russians the entire time.
-
-
The narrator is incorrectly identified.
- By Greenlake DD on 07-30-14
By: Ben Macintyre
-
The Billion Dollar Spy
- A True Story of Cold War Espionage and Betrayal
- By: David E. Hoffman
- Narrated by: Dan Woren
- Length: 11 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
While getting into his car on the evening of February 16, 1978, the chief of the CIA's Moscow station was handed an envelope by an unknown Russian. Its contents stunned the Americans: details of top-secret Soviet research and development in military technology that was totally unknown to the United States.
-
-
Compelling as historical thriller, character study
- By Mr. Pointy on 08-25-15
By: David E. Hoffman
-
Into the Lion's Mouth
- The True Story of Dusko Popov: Word War II Spy, Patriot, and the Real-Life Inspiration for James Bond
- By: Larry Loftis
- Narrated by: Eric G. Dove
- Length: 9 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
James Bond has nothing on Dusko Popov. A double agent for the Abwehr, MI5 and MI6, and the FBI during World War II, Popov seduced numerous women, spoke five languages, and was a crack shot, all while maintaining his cover as a Yugoslavian diplomat....
-
-
A boring account of exciting events.
- By Amazon Customer on 11-30-18
By: Larry Loftis
-
The Fourth Man
- The Hunt for a KGB Spy at the Top of the CIA and the Rise of Putin's Russia
- By: Robert Baer
- Narrated by: Robert Baer, Eric Jason Martin
- Length: 7 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the aftermath of the Cold War, American intelligence caught three high-profile Russian spies: Aldrich Ames, Edward Lee Howard, and Robert Hanssen. However, rumors have long swirled of another mole, one perhaps more damaging than all the others combined. Perhaps the greatest traitor in American history, perhaps a Russian ruse to tear the CIA apart, or perhaps nothing more than a bogeyman, he is often referred to as the Fourth Man.
-
-
A Who Done it without The Who Did it
- By Amazon Customer on 05-25-22
By: Robert Baer
-
Russians Among Us
- Sleeper Cells, Ghost Stories, and the Hunt for Putin’s Spies
- By: Gordon Corera
- Narrated by: Derek Perkins
- Length: 12 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With intrigue that rivals the best le Carre novels, Russians Among Us tells the urgent story of Russia’s espionage efforts against the United States and the West from the end of the Cold War to the present.
-
-
Should be required reading for every citizen
- By Amazon Customer on 02-27-20
By: Gordon Corera
-
Agent Sonya
- Moscow's Most Daring Wartime Spy
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: Ben Macintyre
- Length: 14 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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.
-
-
Wanted to love it
- By Robert Bell on 09-30-20
By: Ben Macintyre
-
A Woman of No Importance
- The Untold Story of the American Spy Who Helped Win World War II
- By: Sonia Purnell
- Narrated by: Juliet Stevenson
- Length: 13 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1942, the Gestapo sent out an urgent transmission: "She is the most dangerous of all Allied spies. We must find and destroy her." The target in their sights was Virginia Hall, a Baltimore socialite who talked her way into Special Operations Executive, the spy organization dubbed Winston Churchill's "Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare." She became the first Allied woman deployed behind enemy lines and - despite her prosthetic leg - helped to light the flame of the French Resistance, revolutionizing secret warfare as we know it.
-
-
Maybe it’s the narrator?
- By Andrea on 09-18-19
By: Sonia Purnell
-
The Spy and the Traitor
- The Greatest Espionage Story of the Cold War
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 13 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
If anyone could be considered a Russian counterpart to the infamous British double-agent Kim Philby, it was Oleg Gordievsky. The son of two KGB agents and the product of the best Soviet institutions, the savvy, sophisticated Gordievsky grew to see his nation's communism as both criminal and philistine. He took his first posting for Russian intelligence in 1968 and eventually became the Soviet Union's top man in London, but from 1973 on he was secretly working for MI6.
-
-
John Lee is GREAT!
- By David on 09-21-18
By: Ben Macintyre
-
Churchill's Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare
- The Mavericks Who Plotted Hitler's Defeat
- By: Giles Milton
- Narrated by: Giles Milton
- Length: 12 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the spring of 1939, a top-secret organization was founded in London: Its purpose was to plot the destruction of Hitler's war machine through spectacular acts of sabotage. The guerrilla campaign that followed was every bit as extraordinary as the six men who directed it. One of them, Cecil Clarke, was a maverick engineer who had spent the 1930s inventing futuristic caravans. Now his talents were put to more devious use: He built the dirty bomb used to assassinate Hitler's favorite, Reinhard Heydrich.
-
-
Rip-Roarin' Tale of Devoted 'Cads'!
- By Gillian on 02-08-17
By: Giles Milton
-
A Man Called Intrepid
- The Incredible WWII Narrative of the Hero Whose Spy Network and Secret Diplomacy Changed the Course of History
- By: William Stevenson
- Narrated by: David McAlister
- Length: 21 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A Man Called Intrepid is the account of the world’s first integrated intelligence operation and of its master, William Stephenson. Codenamed INTREPID by Winston Churchill, Stephenson was charged with establishing and running a vast, worldwide intelligence network to challenge the terrifying force of Nazi Germany. Nothing less than the fate of Britain and the free world hung in the balance as INTREPID covertly set about stalling the Nazis by any means necessary.
-
-
You have to wonder ...
- By Mike From Mesa on 04-15-14
-
The Main Enemy
- The Inside Story of the CIA's Final Showdown with the KGB
- By: Milton Bearden, James Risen
- Narrated by: Christopher Lane
- Length: 19 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A landmark collaboration between a thirty-year veteran of the CIA and a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, The Main Enemy is the inside story of the CIA-KGB spy wars, told through the actions of the men who fought them. Based on hundreds of interviews with operatives from both sides, The Main Enemy puts us inside the heads of CIA officers as they dodge surveillance and walk into violent ambushes in Moscow. This is the story of the generation of spies who came of age in the shadow of the Cuban missile crisis and rose to run the CIA and KGB in the last days of the Cold War.
-
-
A masterpiece of espionage history
- By kucherv on 08-21-18
By: Milton Bearden, and others
-
Agent Garbo
- The Brilliant, Eccentric Secret Agent Who Tricked Hitler & Saved D-Day
- By: Stephan Talty
- Narrated by: Clinton Wade
- Length: 8 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Before he remade himself as the master spy known as Garbo, Juan Pujol was nothing more than a Barcelona poultry farmer. But as Garbo, he turned in a masterpiece of deception that changed the course of World War II. Posing as the Nazis’ only reliable spy inside England, he created an imaginary million-man army, invented armadas out of thin air, and brought a vast network of fictional subagents to life. The scheme culminated on June 6, 1944, when Garbo convinced the Germans that the Allied forces approaching Normandy were just a feint - the real invasion would come at Calais.
-
-
Good story, writing overly dramatic
- By Matthew on 08-13-13
By: Stephan Talty
-
Fall of Giants
- Book One of the Century Trilogy
- By: Ken Follett
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 30 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ken Follett's World Without End was a global phenomenon, a work of grand historical sweep beloved by millions of readers and acclaimed by critics. Fall of Giants is his magnificent new historical epic. The first novel in The Century Trilogy, it follows the fates of five interrelated families - American, German, Russian, English, and Welsh - as they move through the world-shaking dramas of the First World War, the Russian Revolution, and the struggle for women's suffrage.
-
-
Loved it and learned alot.
- By Louis on 10-19-10
By: Ken Follett
-
The Wager
- A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder
- By: David Grann
- Narrated by: Dion Graham, David Grann
- Length: 8 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On January 28, 1742, a ramshackle vessel of patched-together wood and cloth washed up on the coast of Brazil. Inside were thirty emaciated men, barely alive, and they had an extraordinary tale to tell. They were survivors of His Majesty’s Ship the Wager, a British vessel that had left England in 1740 on a secret mission during an imperial war with Spain. While the Wager had been chasing a Spanish treasure-filled galleon known as “the prize of all the oceans,” it had wrecked on a desolate island off the coast of Patagonia.
-
-
Gasping for Air
- By Jean Engle on 04-19-23
By: David Grann
Critic reviews
2013, Edgar Award, Short-listed
"Ben Macintyre and I work in the same period, and I should be reading him because he is such a scrupulous and insightful writer - a master historian. But, with Double Cross and his other excellent works, I always wind up reading him for pleasure. Double Cross may be his best yet, falling somewhere between top-class entertainment and pure addiction." (Alan Furst, author of A Mission to Paris)
"Ben Macintyre's spellbinding account features an improbable cast of characters who pulled off a counter-intelligence feat that was breathtaking in its audacity. Their deceptions within deceptions - known as the Double Cross - were critical to the success of the D-Day invasion, and continued to mislead the Germans long after Allied troops landed on the beaches of Normandy. A truly bravura performance, as is Macintyre's fast-paced tale." (Andrew Nagorski, author of Hitlerland: American Eyewitnesses to the Nazi Rise to Power)
People who viewed this also viewed...
-
Agent Zigzag
- A True Story of Nazi Espionage, Love, and Betrayal
- By: Ben MacIntyre
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 10 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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. Inside the traitor was a man of loyalty; inside the villain was a hero. The problem for Chapman, his spymasters, and his lovers was to know where one persona ended and the other began.
-
-
What a great character
- By Michael on 02-24-09
By: Ben MacIntyre
-
Operation Mincemeat
- How a Dead Man and a Bizarre Plan Fooled the Nazis and Assured an Allied Victory
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 11 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ben Macintyre’s Agent Zigzag was hailed as “rollicking, spellbinding” (New York Times), “wildly improbable but entirely true” (Entertainment Weekly), and, quite simply, “the best book ever written” (Boston Globe). In his new book, Operation Mincemeat, he tells an extraordinary story that will delight his legions of fans. In 1943, from a windowless basement office in London, two brilliant intelligence officers conceived a plan that was both simple and complicated - Operation Mincemeat.
-
-
Better than the movie
- By Jack M on 06-23-10
By: Ben Macintyre
-
A Spy Among Friends
- Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 11 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Who was Kim Philby? Those closest to him—like his fellow MI6 officer and best friend since childhood, Nicholas Elliot, and the CIA’s head of counterintelligence, James Jesus Angleton—knew him as a loyal confidant and an unshakeable patriot. Philby was a brilliant and charming man who rose to head Britain’s counterintelligence against the Soviet Union. Together with Elliott and Angleton he stood on the front lines of the Cold War, holding Communism at bay. But he was secretly betraying them both: He was working for the Russians the entire time.
-
-
The narrator is incorrectly identified.
- By Greenlake DD on 07-30-14
By: Ben Macintyre
-
Agent Sonya
- Moscow's Most Daring Wartime Spy
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: Ben Macintyre
- Length: 14 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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.
-
-
Wanted to love it
- By Robert Bell on 09-30-20
By: Ben Macintyre
-
The Siege
- A Six-Day Hostage Crisis and the Daring Special-Forces Operation That Shocked the World
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: Ben Macintyre
- Length: 14 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
As the American hostage crisis in Iran boiled into its seventh month in the spring of 1980, six heavily armed gunman barged into the Iranian embassy in London, taking twenty-six hostages. What followed over the next six days was an increasingly tense standoff, one that threatened at any moment to spill into a bloodbath.
-
-
Another brilliant book by MacIntyre
- By ian on 09-29-24
By: Ben Macintyre
-
Prisoners of the Castle
- An Epic Story of Survival and Escape from Colditz, the Nazis' Fortress Prison
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: Ben Macintyre
- Length: 13 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this gripping narrative, Ben Macintyre tackles one of the most famous prison stories in history and makes it utterly his own. During World War II, the German army used the towering Colditz Castle to hold the most defiant Allied prisoners. For four years, these prisoners of the castle tested its walls and its guards with ingenious escape attempts that would become legend. But as Macintyre shows, the story of Colditz was about much more than escape.
-
-
Another chapter of history brought to life by a master
- By Steve on 09-28-22
By: Ben Macintyre
-
Agent Zigzag
- A True Story of Nazi Espionage, Love, and Betrayal
- By: Ben MacIntyre
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 10 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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. Inside the traitor was a man of loyalty; inside the villain was a hero. The problem for Chapman, his spymasters, and his lovers was to know where one persona ended and the other began.
-
-
What a great character
- By Michael on 02-24-09
By: Ben MacIntyre
-
Operation Mincemeat
- How a Dead Man and a Bizarre Plan Fooled the Nazis and Assured an Allied Victory
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 11 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ben Macintyre’s Agent Zigzag was hailed as “rollicking, spellbinding” (New York Times), “wildly improbable but entirely true” (Entertainment Weekly), and, quite simply, “the best book ever written” (Boston Globe). In his new book, Operation Mincemeat, he tells an extraordinary story that will delight his legions of fans. In 1943, from a windowless basement office in London, two brilliant intelligence officers conceived a plan that was both simple and complicated - Operation Mincemeat.
-
-
Better than the movie
- By Jack M on 06-23-10
By: Ben Macintyre
-
A Spy Among Friends
- Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 11 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Who was Kim Philby? Those closest to him—like his fellow MI6 officer and best friend since childhood, Nicholas Elliot, and the CIA’s head of counterintelligence, James Jesus Angleton—knew him as a loyal confidant and an unshakeable patriot. Philby was a brilliant and charming man who rose to head Britain’s counterintelligence against the Soviet Union. Together with Elliott and Angleton he stood on the front lines of the Cold War, holding Communism at bay. But he was secretly betraying them both: He was working for the Russians the entire time.
-
-
The narrator is incorrectly identified.
- By Greenlake DD on 07-30-14
By: Ben Macintyre
-
Agent Sonya
- Moscow's Most Daring Wartime Spy
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: Ben Macintyre
- Length: 14 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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.
-
-
Wanted to love it
- By Robert Bell on 09-30-20
By: Ben Macintyre
-
The Siege
- A Six-Day Hostage Crisis and the Daring Special-Forces Operation That Shocked the World
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: Ben Macintyre
- Length: 14 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
As the American hostage crisis in Iran boiled into its seventh month in the spring of 1980, six heavily armed gunman barged into the Iranian embassy in London, taking twenty-six hostages. What followed over the next six days was an increasingly tense standoff, one that threatened at any moment to spill into a bloodbath.
-
-
Another brilliant book by MacIntyre
- By ian on 09-29-24
By: Ben Macintyre
-
Prisoners of the Castle
- An Epic Story of Survival and Escape from Colditz, the Nazis' Fortress Prison
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: Ben Macintyre
- Length: 13 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this gripping narrative, Ben Macintyre tackles one of the most famous prison stories in history and makes it utterly his own. During World War II, the German army used the towering Colditz Castle to hold the most defiant Allied prisoners. For four years, these prisoners of the castle tested its walls and its guards with ingenious escape attempts that would become legend. But as Macintyre shows, the story of Colditz was about much more than escape.
-
-
Another chapter of history brought to life by a master
- By Steve on 09-28-22
By: Ben Macintyre
-
Rogue Heroes
- The History of the SAS, Britain's Secret Special Forces Unit That Sabotaged the Nazis and Changed the Nature of War
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: Ben Macintyre
- Length: 13 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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 their airplanes and war matériel.
-
-
Those Who Dared, Won!
- By Matthew on 10-07-16
By: Ben Macintyre
-
The Spy and the Traitor
- The Greatest Espionage Story of the Cold War
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 13 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
If anyone could be considered a Russian counterpart to the infamous British double-agent Kim Philby, it was Oleg Gordievsky. The son of two KGB agents and the product of the best Soviet institutions, the savvy, sophisticated Gordievsky grew to see his nation's communism as both criminal and philistine. He took his first posting for Russian intelligence in 1968 and eventually became the Soviet Union's top man in London, but from 1973 on he was secretly working for MI6.
-
-
John Lee is GREAT!
- By David on 09-21-18
By: Ben Macintyre
-
Circle of Treason
- CIA Traitor Aldrich Ames and the Men He Betrayed
- By: Sandra V. Grimes, Jeanne Vertefeuille
- Narrated by: Janet Metzger
- Length: 8 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Circle of Treason is the first account written by CIA agents who were key members of the CIA team that conducted the intense "Ames Mole Hunt." Sandra Grimes and Jeanne Vertefeuille were two of the five principals of the CIA team tasked with hunting one of their own and were directly responsible for identifying Ames as the mole, leading to his arrest and conviction.
-
-
The hunt for a mole
- By Jean on 01-15-14
By: Sandra V. Grimes, and others
-
Agent Zigzag
- A True Story of Nazi Espionage, Love, and Betrayal
- By: Ben MacIntyre
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 6 hrs and 16 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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. Inside the traitor was a man of loyalty; inside the villain was a hero. The problem for Chapman, his spymasters, and his lovers was to know where one persona ended and the other began. In 1941, after training as a 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. Instead, he contacted MI5, the British Secret Service.
-
-
Is it a novel? Is it a newspaper article? No, its
- By Steven on 03-27-11
By: Ben MacIntyre
-
The Spy in Moscow Station
- A Counterspy's Hunt for a Deadly Cold War Threat
- By: Eric Haseltine
- Narrated by: Eric Haseltine
- Length: 8 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the late 1970s, the National Security Agency still did not officially exist - those in the know referred to it dryly as the No Such Agency. So why, when NSA engineer Charles Gandy filed for a visa to visit Moscow, did the Russian Foreign Ministry assert with confidence that he was a spy? Outsmarting honey traps and encroaching deep enough into enemy territory to perform complicated technical investigations, Gandy accomplished his mission in Russia but discovered more than State and CIA wanted him to know.
-
-
Dull Dull Dull
- By DVN on 09-02-19
By: Eric Haseltine
-
The Billion Dollar Spy
- A True Story of Cold War Espionage and Betrayal
- By: David E. Hoffman
- Narrated by: Dan Woren
- Length: 11 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
While getting into his car on the evening of February 16, 1978, the chief of the CIA's Moscow station was handed an envelope by an unknown Russian. Its contents stunned the Americans: details of top-secret Soviet research and development in military technology that was totally unknown to the United States.
-
-
Compelling as historical thriller, character study
- By Mr. Pointy on 08-25-15
By: David E. Hoffman
-
SAS Great Escapes
- Seven Great Escapes Made by Real Second World War Heroes
- By: Damien Lewis
- Narrated by: Leighton Pugh
- Length: 9 hrs and 44 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The finest fighting force in the world. Escape. Evade. Survive. Repeat. Seven gripping tales of overcoming the impossible. Arguably the finest special forces troops of the Second World War, the SAS was the jewel in the British military crown. But the near-impossible nature of their heroic missions sometimes left them trapped behind enemy lines, the enemy closing and forced to endure the unendurable. But the unendurable is all in a day’s work for these magnificent seven. Incredible odds. Outstanding bravery. Real adventure.
-
-
No movie can compete
- By J.Brock on 06-09-21
By: Damien Lewis
-
Betrayal in Berlin
- The True Story of the Cold War's Most Audacious Espionage Operation
- By: Steve Vogel
- Narrated by: Joel Richards
- Length: 17 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Its code name was “Operation Gold”, a wildly audacious CIA plan to construct a clandestine tunnel into East Berlin to tap into critical KGB and Soviet military telecommunication lines. The tunnel, crossing the border between the American and Soviet sectors, would have to be 1,500 feet (the length of the Empire State Building) with state-of-the-art equipment, built and operated literally under the feet of their Cold War adversaries.
-
-
Fascinating Book
- By Toni Bowes on 01-11-20
By: Steve Vogel
-
In the Enemy's House
- The Secret Saga of the FBI Agent and the Code Breaker Who Caught the Russian Spies
- By: Howard Blum
- Narrated by: David Colacci
- Length: 11 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1946, genius linguist and codebreaker Meredith Gardner discovered that the KGB was running an extensive network of strategically placed spies inside the United States, whose goal was to infiltrate American intelligence and steal the nation's military and atomic secrets. Over the course of the next decade, he and young FBI supervisor Bob Lamphere worked together on Venona, a top-secret mission to uncover the Soviet agents and protect the Holy Grail of Cold War espionage - the atomic bomb.
-
-
Excellent non-fiction spy story
- By Katherine on 10-13-18
By: Howard Blum
-
The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare
- How Churchill's Secret Warriors Set Europe Ablaze and Gave Birth to Modern Black Ops
- By: Damien Lewis
- Narrated by: NIgel Carrington
- Length: 10 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From the award-winning historian, war reporter, and author Damien Lewis (Zero Six Bravo, Judy) comes the incredible true story of the top-secret "butcher-and-bolt" black ops units Prime Minister Winston Churchill tasked with stopping the unstoppable German war machine. Criminals, rogues, and survivalists, the brutal tactics and grit of these "deniables" would define a military unit the likes of which the world had never seen.
-
-
Dropped many parts of critical chapters.
- By Barry Davis on 07-17-21
By: Damien Lewis
-
Churchill's Band of Brothers
- WWII's Most Daring D-Day Mission and the Hunt to Take Down Hitler's Fugitive War Criminals
- By: Damien Lewis
- Narrated by: Derek Perkins
- Length: 11 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On the night of June 13th, 1944, a 12-man SAS unit parachuted into occupied France. Their objective: hit German forces deep behind the lines, cutting the rail-tracks linking Central France to the northern coastline. In a country crawling with enemy troops, their mission was to prevent Hitler from rushing his Panzer divisions to the D-Day beaches and driving the Allied troops back into the sea. It was a Herculean task, but no risk was deemed too great to stop the Nazi assault.
-
-
Fascinating story of incredible bravery.
- By William R. Todd-Mancillas (Name includes hyphen and capitalized M). on 10-02-21
By: Damien Lewis
-
The Main Enemy
- The Inside Story of the CIA's Final Showdown with the KGB
- By: Milton Bearden, James Risen
- Narrated by: Christopher Lane
- Length: 19 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A landmark collaboration between a thirty-year veteran of the CIA and a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, The Main Enemy is the inside story of the CIA-KGB spy wars, told through the actions of the men who fought them. Based on hundreds of interviews with operatives from both sides, The Main Enemy puts us inside the heads of CIA officers as they dodge surveillance and walk into violent ambushes in Moscow. This is the story of the generation of spies who came of age in the shadow of the Cuban missile crisis and rose to run the CIA and KGB in the last days of the Cold War.
-
-
A masterpiece of espionage history
- By kucherv on 08-21-18
By: Milton Bearden, and others
What made the experience of listening to Double Cross the most enjoyable?
You cannot make the characters in this book up. Well written, well read, and such an outrageous collection of characters, real people, eccentric people, brave men and women who played an important part in collecting and sending miss-information during WWII. I seriously wonder why this hasn't already been made into a mini-series.When is the BBC going to do a Mini Series?
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
The complete spy guide
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Another Ben Macintyre Triumph
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Great book marred by awful narration.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Double Cross review
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
The narrator is horrible
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Great book
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
What made the experience of listening to Double Cross the most enjoyable?
Most folks know the story or the D-day invasion. Probably all but the most studious of us have never heard of the back room intelligence that went into confounding Germany on thatlongest of days.
Ben Macintyre's account is fantastic of the events leading up to, during and after the
invasion from small houses in England to MI-5 headquarters. I enjoyed this as much
as I did Operation Mincemeat, another one of Macintyre's books
What other book might you compare Double Cross to and why?
Operation Mincemeat.What three words best describe John Lee’s performance?
I do enjoyed that it was read by a "reader" with an english accent.Though it did have some draw backs.
Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?
There was the part at the end of the book where one of the control agents continuesto look for one of the spies long after the war.
Any additional comments?
I really wish that John Lee had just read the book and not tried to improvisethe "voices". Every American sounded like they were from Texas, the Russian accents
sound German sometimes and Polish at other times. Polish accents were a mis-mash.
156,000 men, 4 spies, and one dog.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Stunning recount of some amazing people
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
In addition, the details behind British Intelligence's spectacular success are astonishing and detailed. If you like Macintyre, or have an interest in intelligence operations before they became the industrialized, personality-less institutions of the Cold War and beyond, you will love this book.
Finally, is there any way to get John Lee to narrate every book at audible? The performance is perfect - never getting in the way, never adding too much - a great match for this book
Yet another Macintyre hit
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.