Reviews

True Believer: Stalin's Last American Spy by Kati Marton

allyssascott's review

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3.0

Review To Come. I received an advanced copy of this book from Simon & Schuster Canada in exchange for an honest review. I have very mixed feelings about this book. I was very excited to read True Believer. The story and life of Noel Field is an interesting tale but I had some issues on how this story was presented. After reading the blurb I expected more of a biography feel to the book, something that flowed together nicely. What I got instead resembled closely to one of my University history text books.

I struggled through the beginning of this book. Like I said, it felt a lot like a history text book and a lot of it was very dry material for me. There were many times throughout the first half that I considered putting the book down. I just found the beginning, for lack of a better word, boring. I’m sure that someone who is more interested in this time period will definitely disagree with me! I just felt that there was a lot of information that wasn’t necessary to tell the story of Noel Field. I had a difficult time getting engaged in the story, and I think that’s mostly due to the fact that I just couldn’t come to care about Noel Field. There were some parts of the story that I found very interesting, especially in the last half of the book. The last half picked up the pace a little bit and I found myself enjoying it a lot more, I’m happy I didn’t give up in the beginning.
I have a feeling that a lot of history buffs are absolutely going to love this one, and I will definitely recommend it to people who enjoy that time in history, but it just isn’t the time in history that I get overly excited about!

Thank you Simon & Schuster Canada for providing me with a copy of True Believer.

bryonie's review against another edition

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4.0

All in all, a well written book, except for one thing... The principle subject of the book, Noel Field, was pretty dull. Perhaps Stalin's second last American spy might have made for more interesting material?