“The Sisterhood: The Secret History of Women at the CIA”
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Book of the week
| In the CIA’s Directorate of Operations, the discrimination against women was so unrepentant and widespread that a pamphlet circulated that said women simply couldn’t recruit assets because they weren’t “suited to the way of life of a field case officer.”
That was 1973 and if you were a woman in the CIA you were probably a typist or secretary or scribe.
It would take some remarkably determined women to change the stultifying culture of the CIA and that’s what Liza Mundy’s new book, “The Sisterhood: The Secret History of Women at the CIA” is about.
Creating superb portraits of the women who broke barriers to excel at espionage, Mundy takes us inside challenging training regimens, covert operations and both the triumphs and disappointments inevitable in the spy game.
Although the CIA's history remains mostly stories about men, Mundy writes: ”The women were there all along, though the agency sought ways to suppress their voices and set them against one another, even as the male leaders relied on their loyalty, their skills at elicitation, their attention to detail and their insights.”
— Kerri Miller | MPR News |
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| | Ask a Bookseller: ‘The Boys in the Boat’ |
The historical sports drama “The Boys in the Boat,” directed by George Clooney, is now in theaters. It’s based on Daniel James Brown’s nonfiction book by the same name, and Sarah Dorn of The Nook in Brookings, S.D., highly recommends reading it. | |
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