
The Walls Have Ears
The Greatest Intelligence Operation of World War II
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Narrated by:
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Jean Gilpin
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By:
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Helen Fry
About this listen
A history of the elaborate and brilliantly sustained World War II intelligence operation by which Hitler's generals were tricked into giving away vital Nazi secrets...
At the outbreak of World War II, MI6 spymaster Thomas Kendrick arrived at the Tower of London to set up a top secret operation: German prisoners' cells were to be bugged and listeners installed behind the walls to record and transcribe their private conversations. This mission proved so effective that it would go on to be set up at three further sites - and provide the Allies with crucial insight into new technology being developed by the Nazis.
In this astonishing history, Helen Fry uncovers the inner workings of the bugging operation. On arrival at stately-homes-turned-prisons like Trent Park, high-ranking German generals and commanders were given a "phony" interrogation, then treated as "guests," wined and dined at exclusive clubs, and encouraged to talk. And so it was that the Allies got access to some of Hitler's most closely guarded secrets - and from those most entrusted to protect them.
©2019 Helen Fry (P)2019 Random House AudioListeners also enjoyed...
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Nuking the Moon
- And Other Intelligence Schemes and Military Plots Left on the Drawing Board
- By: Vince Houghton
- Narrated by: Vince Houghton
- Length: 8 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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In 1958, the US Air Force nuked the moon as a show of military force. In 1967, the CIA sent live cats to spy on the Soviet government. In 1942, the British built a torpedo-proof aircraft carrier out of an iceberg. Of course, none of these things ever actually happened. But in Nuking the Moon, intelligence historian Vince Houghton proves that abandoned plans can be just as illuminating - and every bit as entertaining - as the ones that made it.
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Manchild writes book filled with his opinion
- By Just One More Opinion On The Internet on 08-31-19
By: Vince Houghton
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The Unidentified
- Mythical Monsters, Alien Encounters, and Our Obsession with the Unexplained
- By: Colin Dickey
- Narrated by: Will Damron
- Length: 10 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
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In a world where rational, scientific explanations are more available than ever, belief in the unprovable and irrational - in fringe - is on the rise: from Atlantis to aliens, from Flat Earth to the Loch Ness monster, the list goes on. It seems the more our maps of the known world get filled in, the more we crave mysterious locations full of strange creatures. Enter Colin Dickey, cultural historian and tour guide of the weird.
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Skeptic's Analysis of Weird America
- By Adrian on 11-23-20
By: Colin Dickey
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The Book of Not Knowing
- Exploring the True Nature of Self, Mind, and Consciousness
- By: Peter Ralston, Laura Ralston - editor
- Narrated by: Keith O'Brien
- Length: 19 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Through decades of martial arts and meditation practice, Peter Ralston discovered a curious and paradoxical fact: that true awareness arises from a state of not knowing. Even the most sincere investigation of self and spirit, he says, is often sabotaged by our tendency to grab too quickly for answers and ideas as we retreat to the safety of the known.
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Painful
- By MJ on 05-09-19
By: Peter Ralston, and others
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Fatherland
- A Memoir of War, Conscience, and Family Secrets
- By: Burkhard Bilger
- Narrated by: Burkhard Bilger
- Length: 8 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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What do we owe the past? How to make peace with a dark family history? Burkhard Bilger hardly knew his grandfather growing up. His parents immigrated to Oklahoma from Germany after World War II, and though his mother was an historian, she rarely talked about her father or what he did during the war. Then one day a packet of letters arrived from Germany, yellowing with age, and a secret history began to unfold.
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a window into a little-explored aspect of WWII
- By Marjorie on 09-23-23
By: Burkhard Bilger
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The Rising
- The Twenty-Year Battle to Rebuild the World Trade Center
- By: Larry Silverstein
- Narrated by: Fred Sanders
- Length: 9 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
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After the terrorist attacks of 9/11 destroyed the World Trade Center, New Yorkers and Americans faced a critical set of questions: What should be done with the site? Could the towers be replaced? And how best to memorialize those lost on that day? For Larry Silverstein, a lifelong New Yorker who had signed a lease for the properties just a few months before the attacks, the answer was clear: America had to rebuild as quickly as possible.
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Starts great before it morphs quickly into Larry Silverstein paying homage to himself
- By Xj517 on 10-11-24
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Fantasy Island
- Colonialism, Exploitation, and the Betrayal of Puerto Rico
- By: Ed Morales
- Narrated by: Sean Duffy
- Length: 10 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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In Fantasy Island, Ed Morales traces how, over the years, Puerto Rico has served as a colonial satellite, a Cold War Caribbean showcase, a dumping ground for US manufactured goods, and a corporate tax shelter. He also shows how it has become a blank canvas for mercenary experiments in disaster capitalism on the frontlines of climate change, hamstrung by internal political corruption and the US federal government's prioritization of outside financial interests.
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Gringo Narrattion
- By shakira julia on 02-08-21
By: Ed Morales
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The Urge
- Our History of Addiction
- By: Carl Erik Fisher
- Narrated by: Mark Deakins
- Length: 11 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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As a psychiatrist in training fresh from medical school, Carl Erik Fisher found himself face-to-face with an addiction crisis that nearly cost him everything. Desperate to make sense of his condition, he turned to the history of addiction, learning that our society’s current quagmire is only part of a centuries-old struggle to treat addictive behavior.
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Nailed it
- By Paully on 11-23-22
By: Carl Erik Fisher
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Lapidarium
- The Secret Lives of Stones
- By: Hettie Judah
- Narrated by: Nina Wadia
- Length: 8 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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Stones have furnished our earliest technologies and our first art materials. As jewelry and talismans, they have accompanied us in our journeys into the afterlife. We have carried stones over vast distances, erecting temples with them where we gathered to worship our gods. The earliest scientists ground and processed minerals in a centuries-long quest for a mythic stone that would prolong human life. Michelangelo climbed mountains in Tuscany searching for the sugar-white marble that would yield his sculptures.
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Lovely Bite-Sized Stories
- By Anonymous User on 07-20-23
By: Hettie Judah
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The Enemy at the Gate
- Habsburgs, Ottomans, and the Battle for Europe
- By: Andrew Wheatcroft
- Narrated by: Stefan Rudnicki
- Length: 11 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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The Great Siege of Vienna is the centerpiece for historian Andrew Wheatcroft's richly drawn portrait of the centuries-long rivalry between the Ottoman and Habsburg empires for control of the European continent. A gripping work by a master historian, The Enemy at the Gate offers a timely examination of an epic clash of civilizations.
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Look elsewhere
- By Ben H. on 09-20-21
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I Want You to Know We're Still Here
- A Post-Holocaust Memoir
- By: Esther Safran Foer
- Narrated by: Ellen Archer, Esther Safran Foer
- Length: 6 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Esther Safran Foer grew up in a home where the past was too terrible to speak of. The child of parents who were each the sole survivors of their respective families, for Esther the Holocaust loomed in the backdrop of daily life, felt but never discussed. The result was a childhood marked by painful silences and continued tragedy. Even as she built a successful career, married, and raised three children, Esther always felt herself searching.
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Interesting but…
- By mk on 08-23-21
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Untold Power
- The Fascinating Rise and Complex Legacy of First Lady Edith Wilson
- By: Rebecca Boggs Roberts
- Narrated by: Saskia Maarleveld
- Length: 8 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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While this nation has yet to elect its first woman president—and though history has downplayed her role—just over a century ago a woman became the nation’s first acting president. In fact, she was born in 1872, and her name was Edith Bolling Galt Wilson. For the first time, we have a biography that takes an unflinching look at the woman whose ascent mirrors that of many powerful American women before and since, one full of the compromises and complicities women have undertaken throughout time in order to find security for themselves and make their mark on history.
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Readers voice lacked Edith’s strength
- By Heidi on 08-01-24
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What You Have Heard Is True
- A Memoir of Witness and Resistance
- By: Carolyn Forché
- Narrated by: Carolyn Forché
- Length: 12 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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What You Have Heard is True is a devastating, lyrical, and visionary memoir about a young woman’s brave choice to engage with horror in order to help others. Written by one of the most gifted poets of her generation, this is the story of a woman’s radical act of empathy, and her fateful encounter with an intriguing man who changes the course of her life.
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Beautiful story
- By Norhilda on 05-09-19
By: Carolyn Forché
I didn't like the reader's use of a fake German accent. But other then that it is a good listen.
inresting look into a secret world.
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Terrible accent mars interesting story
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