Spy Wore Red: My Adventures as an Undercover Agent in World War II FROM THE CRITICS
Publishers Weekly
The adventurous spirit of Brooklyn-born Aline Griffith led to a danger- and glamor-filled career as an agent for the Office of Strategic Services in WW II Madrid where, as a member of international high society, she infiltrated a German spy network that threatened Allied invasion plans. In her suspenseful account, including admittedly reinvented dialogue and, one suspects, occasional dramatic embellishment, she recalls not only her undercover exploits but romances with a traitorous counterspy, a celebrated matador and encounters with the Spanish grandee she later married. Elegant parties in palaces and estates, flamenco cafes and the Prado Museum served as settings for her intrigues and hair-raising escapades about which she now entertains audiences on the lecture circuit. First serial to Vanity Fair. (May 18)
Library Journal
An American who later married into the Spanish nobility, the author began her career as a ``queen of international society'' by working as a decoder for the OSS. Her book describes how she (nee Aline Griffith) was recruited by the OSS while working as a model at Hattie Carnegie's, trained in espionage, and sent to Madrid. Once there, says Romanones, she decoded secret messages, organized a chain of women spies, and mingled among the cream of Spanish society to ferret out information about Nazis and German sympathizers. The author also details her lifestyle among the rich and famous. Indeed, so active was her social life that one wonders how she had any time for business. Still, since the book may well be destined for bestsellerdom, public libaries will want to consider. Essentially silly, however. Ann Sullivan, Tomkins Cortland Community Coll. Lib., Dryden, N.Y.
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