The Terminal Spy
A True Story of Espionage, Betrayal and Murder
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Narrated by:
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Simon Vance
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By:
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Alan S. Cowell
About this listen
On November 1, 2006, Alexander Litvinenko sipped tea in London's Millennium Hotel. Hours later, the Russian former intelligence officer, who was sharply critical of Russian president Vladimir Putin, fell ill, and within days was rushed to the hospital. Fatally poisoned by a rare radioactive isotope slipped into his drink, Litvinenko issued a dramatic deathbed statement accusing Putin himself of engineering his murder.
Alan S. Cowell, then London Bureau Chief of the New York Times, who covered the story from its inception, has written the definitive story of this assassination and of the profound international implications of this first act of nuclear terrorism.
Who was Alexander Litvinenko? What had happened in Russia since the end of the cold war to make his life there untenable and in severe jeopardy, even in England, the country that had granted him asylum? And how did he really die?
The life of Alexander Litvinenko provides a riveting narrative in its own right, culminating in an event that rang alarm bells among Western governments at the ease with which radioactive materials were deployed in a major Western capital to commit a unique crime.
But it also evokes a wide range of other issues: Russia's lurch to authoritarianism, the return of the KGB to the Kremlin, the perils of a new cold war driven by Russia's oil riches, and Vladimir Putin's thirst for power.
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CIA Rogues and the Killing of the Kennedys
- How and Why US Agents Conspired to Assassinate JFK and RFK
- By: Patrick Nolan, Dr. Henry C. Lee - foreword
- Narrated by: Stephen Bowlby
- Length: 14 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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In CIA Rogues and the Killing of the Kennedys, Patrick Nolan fearlessly investigates the CIA’s involvement in the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy and Senator Robert F. Kennedy - why the brothers needed to die and how rogue intelligence agents orchestrated history’s most infamous conspiracy. Nolan furthers the research of leading scholars who agree that there remain serious unanswered questions regarding the assassinations of John F. Kennedy and Robert F. Kennedy.
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Where are we now?
- By Payton on 04-12-17
By: Patrick Nolan, and others
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Mafia Spies
- The Inside Story of the CIA, Gangsters, JFK, and Castro
- By: Thomas Maier
- Narrated by: Fred Stella
- Length: 15 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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Mafia Spies is the definitive account of America’s most remarkable espionage plots ever - with CIA agents, mob hitmen, “kompromat” sex, presidential indiscretion, and James Bond-like killing devices together in a top-secret mystery full of surprise twists and deadly intrigue. In the early 1960s, two top gangsters, Johnny Roselli and Sam Giancana, were hired by the CIA to kill Cuba’s Communist leader, Fidel Castro, only to wind up murdered themselves amidst Congressional hearings and a national debate about the JFK assassination.
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Stick to history
- By Amazon Customer on 05-04-19
By: Thomas Maier
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Agent M
- The Lives and Spies of MI5's Maxwell Knight
- By: Henry Hemming
- Narrated by: Henry Hemming
- Length: 11 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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The fascinating, improbable true story of Maxwell Knight - the great MI5 spymaster and inspiration for the James Bond character M. Maxwell Knight was perhaps the greatest spymaster in history. He did more than anyone in his era to combat the rising threat of fascism in Britain during World War II, in spite of his own history inside this movement. He was also truly eccentric - a thrice-married jazz aficionado who kept a menagerie of exotic pets - and almost totally unqualified for espionage. Yet he had a gift for turning practically anyone into a fearless secret agent.
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Outstanding in every way!
- By Grace O'Malley on 07-18-22
By: Henry Hemming
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The Art of Betrayal
- The Secret History of MI6 - Life and Death in the British Secret Service
- By: Gordon Corera
- Narrated by: Graeme Malcolm
- Length: 17 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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From Berlin to the Congo, from Moscow to the back streets of London, these are the stories of the agents on the front lines of British intelligence. And the truth is often more remarkable than fiction.
MI6 has been cloaked in secrecy and shrouded in myth since it was created a hundred years ago. Our understanding of what it is to be a spy has been largely defined by the fictional worlds of Ian Fleming and John le Carré. Gordon Corera provides a unique and unprecedented insight into this secret world and the reality that lies behind the fiction.
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Good details but lacks thorough research
- By Unapologetic on 09-06-17
By: Gordon Corera
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The Good Spy
- The Life and Death of Robert Ames
- By: Kai Bird
- Narrated by: René Ruiz
- Length: 14 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
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The Good Spy is Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer Kai Bird’s compelling portrait of the remarkable life and death of one of the most important operatives in CIA history - a man who, had he lived, might have helped heal the rift between Arabs and the West. On April 18, 1983, a bomb exploded outside the American Embassy in Beirut, killing 63 people. The attack was a geopolitical turning point. It marked the beginning of Hezbollah as a political force, but even more important, it eliminated America’s most influential and effective intelligence officer in the Middle East - CIA operative Robert Ames.
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Biased but interesting
- By Peggy on 05-09-18
By: Kai Bird
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A Spy Among Friends
- Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal
- By: Ben Macintyre
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 11 hrs
- Unabridged
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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.
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The narrator is incorrectly identified.
- By Greenlake DD on 07-30-14
By: Ben Macintyre
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The Man Without a Face
- The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin
- By: Masha Gessen
- Narrated by: Masha Gessen
- Length: 10 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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The Man Without a Face is the chilling account of how a low-level, small-minded KGB operative ascended to the Russian presidency and, in an astonishingly short time, destroyed years of progress and made his country once more a threat to its own people and to the world.
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A Preview of Authoritarianism in the USA
- By Jimmy O on 06-08-19
By: Masha Gessen
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Spymaster
- Startling Cold War Revelations of a Soviet KGB Chief
- By: Tennent H. Bagley
- Narrated by: Bronson Pinchot
- Length: 8 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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From the dark days of World War II through the Cold War, Sergey A. Kondrashev was a major player in Russia’s notorious KGB espionage apparatus. Rising through its ranks through hard work and keen understanding of how the spy and political games are played, he “handled” American and British defectors, recruited Western operatives as double agents, served as a ranking officer at the East Berlin and Vienna KGB bureaus, and tackled special assignments from the Kremlin.
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An brilliant personal Cold War perspective
- By Iamnotaspy on 01-09-15
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Havana Nocturne
- How the Mob Owned Cuba...and Then Lost It to the Revolution
- By: T. J. English
- Narrated by: Mel Foster
- Length: 13 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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Havana Nocturne takes listeners back to Cuba in the years when it was a veritable devil's playground for mob leaders Meyer Lansky and Charles "Lucky" Luciano. Thanks to strong ties with the island's brutal dictator, President Batista, the mob soon owned the biggest luxury hotels and casinos and launched an unprecedented tourist boom. But their dreams collided with those of Fidel Castro, Che Guevara, and others.
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Not for reactionaries
- By sunsolid on 02-17-09
By: T. J. English
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Missing Man
- The American Spy Who Vanished in Iran
- By: Barry Meier
- Narrated by: Ray Porter
- Length: 8 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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In late 2013, Americans were shocked to learn that a former FBI agent turned private investigator who disappeared in Iran in 2007 was there on a mission for the CIA. The missing man, Robert Levinson, appeared in pictures dressed like a Guantánamo prisoner and pleaded in a video for help from the United States.
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Important story
- By Richard F. Callahan on 08-03-16
By: Barry Meier
What listeners say about The Terminal Spy
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Stuart Woodward
- 10-23-11
Slow but gets there in the end.
The initial part of the book is detailed and slow going but the story picks up when it gets to the hunt for the Polonium around London and into Europe. While it covers Russian politics and intrigue in great depth we are never really sure, even at the end, who, if anyone, authorized the poisoning but with such a full exposition of the background and facts the listener is well equipped to come to their own conclusion and realize why we may never know the full details of the story.
The chapters regarding Polonium should be required reading for anyone involved in public safety.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Bluestramp
- 01-09-17
Great news story
A 5 star behind the scenes investigation on Russian politics. A well researched well narrated expose on Putin era assassination. How the billionaire oligarchs bought up England's prime real estate and put down roots while criticizing Putin's thug-like diplomacy.
But one former KGB star spy just talked too much and was poisoned with a potent radioactive agent triggering an international murder investigation.
Terrific tale.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Jason Buneo
- 03-07-17
Polonium 210
I did enjoy the story, but the narrative seemed to all over the place. The instance of Litvinenko's death is foreshadowed more than a dozen times. This made the book seem really repetitive. Also the narrator's instance of calling Polonium 210 "two, one , oh" really got annoying. I have never heard it called that.
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- Michelle
- 08-13-13
Excellent
If you could sum up The Terminal Spy in three words, what would they be?
I enjoyed the book very much. I like listening to Vance, he always does a great job.
Have you listened to any of Simon Vance’s other performances before? How does this one compare?
I have listened to many of his performances. This is an excellent one.
Any additional comments?
Great book, great performance. Definitely recommend.
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- gc dunn
- 05-29-16
Don't purchase this book
The only reason I even finished listening was because I paid $25 for it. If you decide to give it a try skip staight to chapter 11. Before that it's a boring, pointless history that only marginally has to do with the story.
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- Martin
- 11-28-13
SLOOOOOWWWW
What would have made The Terminal Spy better?
Too much explaining and it is like a history - which it probably is. No real spy stuff here, unless it is undercover :-).
Has The Terminal Spy turned you off from other books in this genre?
No
Who would you have cast as narrator instead of Simon Vance?
NA
What reaction did this book spark in you? Anger, sadness, disappointment?
Author is not so good
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