Spymistress Audiobook By William Stevenson cover art

Spymistress

The True Story of the Greatest Female Secret Agent of World War II

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Spymistress

By: William Stevenson
Narrated by: Nicholas Camm
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A rousing tale of espionage and unsung valor, this is the captivating true story of Vera Atkins, Great Britain's spymistress from the age of 25. With her fierce intelligence, blunt manner, personal courage, and exceptional informants, Vera ran countless missions throughout the 1930s. After rising to the leadership echelon in the Special Operations Executive (SOE), a covert intelligence agency formed by Winston Churchill, she became head of a clandestine army in World War II. Her team went deep behind enemy lines, linked up with resistance fighters, destroyed vital targets, helped Allied pilots escape capture, assassinated German soldiers, and radioed information back to London. As the biographer of her mentor in the SOE, William Stevenson was the only person Vera Atkins trusted to record her story.

©2007, 2011 William Stevenson (P)2014 Audible, Inc. 20th Century Americas Espionage Historical Military Military & War Modern Politicians Politics & Activism True Crime United States Wars & Conflicts Women World War II War Winston Churchill Imperialism Interwar Period Franklin D. Roosevelt Royalty Middle Ages Self-Determination Inspiring Imperial Japan Russia Soviet Union Submarine
Fascinating Historical Content • Brave Spy Stories • Pleasant Accent • Fascinating Characters • Well-researched Material
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encyclopedic who's who of the F branch of the SOE....a bible for French resistance genre addicts...dive in, come up with respect...fabulous narration as well

incredible

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This book reveals the rarely seen dimension of the British SOE which made something from nothing in the course of defeating the Nazis. Regardless of British bureaucratic 5th column acts born of envy and Communist machinations, Vera (Goldberg) Atkins used any and every avenue to achieve success by clandestine means.

I was left marveling at the cast of characters, from Chuck Yeager to William E. Colby, who crossed her path and even worked beside her, as well as those post-war leaders who obstructed SOE’s efforts and obliterated SOE’s achievements.

What we call courage, she called integrity, and our children will be bitter that we confuse those words.

She won WWII, despite British priggery

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The story is fascinating though it jumps around a lot, following people and events rather than chronology. But it offered much I didn’t know about the “close work” clandestine operations and the people who gave their life, and for many their lives to a noble cause. The brutality of the war on civilians is hard to take, but that part must be recognized. The indifference to the Jews and rampant antisemitism at the war’s end continues to play out even today. Vera Atkinson is a woman to honor. But I agree the narrator is monotone, but you can get past it.

For those well versed in WWII history

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Loved this! Had known nothing of this brilliant woman.
About time her genius was celebrated.
If they had stars on the wall in England, like at CIA she would deserve three.

Narrator's matter-of-fact voice makes her accomplishments more dramatic.

Amazing- Helps Make up for Misogyny in Time of War

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If you could sum up Spymistress in three words, what would they be?

The content of the book is fascinating, but the narrator speaks too fast. It takes such concentration to follow the book because of the fast reading and the jam-packed content. Generally I prefer audiobooks to actually reading a book, but in this case, I'd prefer to read the book.

Narrator speaks too fast

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The woman known as Vera Adkins worked tirelessly, secretly, in the background during World War II, as one of the people who had a clear view of the threat Hitler posed to Europe and Great Britain. Most of the British government behaved as if it was still the 19th century. The upper and upper middle class was in charge and was appalled at the idea that anyone else could be allowed to make decisions or even play a large part in running the government. They didn't understand what Hitler intended, and consistently undermined the efforts of the people who did.

Much of the book speaks to the rise of Hitler in the 1930's, and the efforts of Vera Adkins and others to stay aware of the Nazi efforts to take control of Germany. Many in England thought they could appease Hitler and make deals with him, and didn't understand that he would never honor those deals. Many people in government still believed they could control Hitler, and that what he did
in Europe, or to the Jews, wasn't their business. Some still thought they could wage war - if it even came to that - on horseback and that mechanized weapons were unnecessary!

Before Churchill was Prime Minister he realized he needed two things - good information from Europe, and an agile, independent force who could strike at Hitler's forces. Vera Adkins was instrumental in setting up and running such an organization. She had very little support from the government, and there were those in power who actively worked against her. They couldn't see that her people got results, with better effect than the old-fashioned ways of the entrenched government officials. In the end, the work of the Special Operations Executive shortened the war by several months. After the war one American official stated that if SOE had been fully funded the war might have ended a year or more earlier. The SOE was the beginning of modern spying, and was the example used in the US to begin the Green Berets in the Viet Nam war, and probably Seal Team 6.

The book isn't easy to listen to, because the narrative jumps between places, times and people. The narrator doesn't pause between these transitions so I had to listen closely to keep up. It's not a story that has an obvious beginning, middle and end. Rather, it's a retelling of a time when most people just wanted to get on with their lives and pretend everything was ok, while the ground beneath them was shifting in unimaginable ways. Vera Adkins and others like her were trying to keep up with the shifts and undercurrents that were driving their world towards war, and doing everything thing they could to keep up with changes and do anything they could to stop or slow down the Nazis.

If you're a history buff you'll find this fascinating. The parallels between the 1930's and today are startling, in the US and around the world. We can say Never Again, but maybe history is repeating itself.

One woman's vision that helped end WWII

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This read more like a textbook than a biography. Although my mind drifted often & I had to repeat sections, I learned a lot when I was able to concentrate. While mostly monotone, the narrator spoke several languages authentically.

Dry, yet interesting

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The underlying story of Vera Atkins is definitely a story worth telling. And this is the most comprehensive telling that I have listened to. But, perhaps it was an impossible task to coral so many skeins of the story into a coherent whole. The constant back-and-forth between Vera's story and the stories of the many, many people she interacted with was irritating & confusing. The tat-a-tat rhythm the narrator used was tiresome and made it all to easy to drift away from listening.

too dense to listen to

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I nearly didn’t listen to this book because of the negative reviews concerning the narration.
I loved the quiet professional voice of the narrator!
The book is interesting and I highly recommend it. I have listened and read many books on this topic but this was new and informative.

Karin G

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What made the experience of listening to Spymistress the most enjoyable?

The story itself. And the writing was brisk and informative.

Who was your favorite character and why?

Why, the Spymistress, of course

How did the narrator detract from the book?

Really a one tone narrator. Very little inflection. It was, literally, mono-tonous. It is really too bad because the story is very interesting, and one that needs to be told. It is quite remarkable that this performance was 'approved' by editors/directors. Sentence after sentence delivered with the same intonation contours. It becomes almost impossible to distinguish given and new information.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

Only a strong reaction to the performance. I like the narrator's accent, but his lack of any kind of variation in delivery made listening a challenge.

Any additional comments?

I finished the book because I wanted to hear the story. And it was well told, just not narrated very well at all.

Great Story - Unfortunately Monotone Performance

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