The Spy Wore Silk

The Spy Wore SilkAmerica's most captivating secret agent tells the true story of a Cold War mission into Morocco with William Casey.“For glamor, adventure and intrigue, this is as good as it gets,” wrote Cosmopolitan of The Spy Went Dancing, Aline Romanones' best selling successor to her memoir of OSS adventures during World War II, The Spy Wore Red. American beauty, Spanish socialite, devoted wife and mother, and spy, Aline, Countess of Romanones, wrote Time, lived a life of glamour and danger that Ingrid Bergman only played at in Notorius. Now in her third book, Aline unveils a true story of royalty and murder. It is 1971, and news reports of the near-assassination of Morocco's King Hassan II shock Aline. Just months before, she had received veiled warnings of such a plot, but few people had paid much attention. Now it is her job to make sure that the would be assassins do not succeed in their second attempt.With the help of onetime OSS colleague and future CIA chief William Casey, she searches for the conspirators, from the shadowy back streets of the Marrakesh souks to the lavish palaces of Casablanca and Rabat, from exotic desert banquets that turn into terrorist targets to elaborate shooting parties masking treachery and death. With the days running out, she must somehow untangle the complex web of motives and deceptions perpetrated by traitors, Soviet agents, illicit lovers, and uncertain allies, in order to ensure the king's survival-and increasingly , her own. Written with great style and her supreme talent for both suspense and the exotic details of high society, the spy Wore Silk is irresistible real life intrigue. “My husband's role in The Spy Wore Silk fills me with pride. I wish Bill could have read this terrific, gripping story- not only because his patriotism and courage come through so clearly, but also because the book is so much fun.” Sophia Casey, widow of William Casey, CIA Director, 1981-1987

They were once orphans from London's roughest slums. Now they are students of Mrs. Merlin's Academy for Select Young Ladies, learning the art of spying and seduction. Bold, beautiful, and oh-so-dangerous, they are England's ultimate secret weapons. The most skilled of Merlin's Maidens, Siena must unmask a traitor lurking among an exclusive club of book collectors. Armed with only her wits, her blades, and her sultry body, she joins the gentlemen at a country house party. But her prime suspect, disgraced ex-army officer Lord Kirtland proves as enigmatic as he is suspicious-and sinfully sensuous. Kirtland's instincts tell him the enticing "Black Dove" is hiding more than a luscious body beneath her fancy silks. Yet as he starts to plumb her secrets, a cunning adversary lays plans to destroy them both. To live, Siena must end her tantalizing dance of deception and desire-and decide whether to trust her head or her heart.

The author reveals a true story of royalty and murder as she searches the backstreets of Marrakesh and palaces of Casablanca to ensure the survival of Morocco's King Hassan--and her own

A thrilling, seductive adventure from award-winning author Alyssa Alexander… After he is betrayed by one of his own, British spy Julian Travers, Earl of Langford, refuses to retire without a fight, vowing to find the traitor. But when the trail leads to his childhood home, Julian is forced to return to a place he swore he’d never see again, and meet a woman who may be his quarry—in more ways than one. Though she may appear a poor young woman dependant on charity, Grace Hannah’s private life is far more interesting. By night, she finds friendship and freedom as a member of a smuggling ring. But when the handsome Julian arrives, she finds her façade slipping, and she is soon compromised, as well as intrigued. As she and Julian continue the hunt, Grace finds herself falling in love with the man behind the spy. Yet Julian’s past holds a dark secret. And when he must make a choice between love and espionage, that secret may tear them apart.

THE SPY WORE RED, New York Times best seller listWhen Aline Griffith was born in Pearl River, New York, in 1923, one might have guessed from her exceptional beauty that a career as an actress or a model might be in her future. Few would have imagined that twenty-one years later, she would find herself in Spain as a deep-cover OSS agent, infiltrating the highest levels of Spanish society; or that five years later still, she would marry a Spanish grandee and become one of the most watched, most admired, most fascinating women of international society. This is the story of Aline, Countess of Romanones, a story of courage, beauty and success that will move readers with its amazing combination of autobiographical fact and narrative force. Reading The Spy Wore Red is like stepping into the script of Hitchcock's 1946 Cary Grant- Ingrid Bergman film Notorious. After confiding in 1943 to a young admirer her desire to serve the Allied cause, the fledgling model is recruited, sent to Washington. Trained as a spy and flown to Spain, Her mission: to uncover Madrid's high-society links to the German Nazi regime. As an undercover agent, Aline wends her way through lavish Madrid balls and dinners greeting the crème de la crème of Spanish society noting handshakes, wings and now among suspected – individuals. She and her colleagues live by code name, hers bing”Tiger” and by their wits. When security is breached, Aline is endangered, and she narrowly escapes several attempts on her life. When she falls in love with one of her fellow agents, complications-and hazards- abound. The Spy Wore Red is full of amazing plot turns, and readers will have to remind themselves they are reading a memoir. It is also full of astounding charters and some startling revelations about them: Madrid high society is peppered with Nazi spies, and successful- is to expose them. “My colleague Aline Romanones has written a Fascinating and exiting story evoking those marvelous days we served in the OSS in Europe. Her narrative reflects sensitively and accurately the clandestine intrigue and strategic maneuvers that marked the struggle between the secret services as well as the Allied and Axis powers and the atmosphere and high social live in wartime Spain.”William J. Casey, OSS agent, 1942-45, CIA director, 1981-1987

The hidden history of an ordinary American girl who became one of the OSS's most daring World War II spies before marrying into European nobility.

The author describes a 1966 mission when she was called out of semi-retirement to uncover a highly placed NATO mole, an assignment for which she recruited an old friend, Wallis Simpson

A USA TODAY BESTSELLER! "A powerful debut that proves the threads that interweave our lives can withstand time and any tide, and bind our hearts forever."—Susanna Kearsley, New York Times bestselling author of Belleweather and The Vanished Days A historical novel inspired by true events, Kelli Estes's brilliant and atmospheric debut is a poignant tale of two women determined to do the right thing, highlighting the power of our own stories. The smallest items can hold centuries of secrets... While exploring her aunt's island estate, Inara Erickson is captivated by an elaborately stitched piece of fabric hidden in the house. The truth behind the silk sleeve dated back to 1886, when Mei Lien, the lone survivor of a cruel purge of the Chinese in Seattle found refuge on Orcas Island and shared her tragic experience by embroidering it. As Inara peels back layer upon layer of the centuries of secrets the sleeve holds, her life becomes interwoven with that of Mei Lein. Through the stories Mei Lein tells in silk, Inara uncovers a tragic truth that will shake her family to its core—and force her to make an impossible choice. Should she bring shame to her family and risk everything by telling the truth, or tell no one and dishonor Mei Lien's memory? A touching and tender book for fans of Marie Benedict, Susanna Kearsley, and Duncan Jepson, The Girl Who Wrote in Silk is a dual-time period novel that explores how a delicate piece of silk interweaves the past and the present, reminding us that today's actions have far reaching implications. Praise for The Girl Who Wrote in Silk: "A beautiful, elegiac novel, as finely and delicately woven as the title suggests. Kelli Estes spins a spellbinding tale that illuminates the past in all its brutality and beauty, and the humanity that binds us all together." —Susan Wiggs, New York Times bestselling author of The Beekeeper's Ball "A touching and tender story about discovering the past to bring peace to the present." —Duncan Jepson, author of All the Flowers in Shanghai "Vibrant and tragic, The Girl Who Wrote in Silk explores a horrific, little-known era in our nation's history. Estes sensitively alternates between Mei Lien, a young Chinese-American girl who lived in the late 1800s, and Inara, a modern recent college grad who sets Mei Lien's story free." —Margaret Dilloway, author of How to Be an American Housewife and Sisters of Heart and Snow