Customer Reviews

Ace of Spies: The True Story of Sidney Reilly (Revealing History)

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Real-life British agent Sidney Reilly (he took an Irish professional name for the irony of the act) began life in nineteenth-century Russia, raised in a wealthy Christian household, but secretly the illegitimate son of his neurotic mother's Jewish doctor. Born Sigmund Gregorivich Rosenblum, "Reilly" traveled the world from the oil fields of Baku to the boiling kettle of Manchuria during the Russo-Japanese War, representing British interests and creating his own enduring legend. A risk-taker, a daredevil, a master of disguise and first-rate actor, the ruthlessly amoral Reilly, who spoke seven languages and appears to have had a photographic mind, faced death many times over and seemed utterly devoid of fear as he enjoyed success after success in his life of peril. Among the first secret agents of the modern stripe, Reilly routinely disobeyed orders from his superiors in London, men of the old school whose creed regarding espionage was that "gentleman do not open each other's mail." Reilly's career reads like fiction but is cold hard reality. He went undercover in Germany, just before the First World War in order to swipe German military plans vital to British security. He infiltrated ex-pat European society in the Far East to provide much-needed information to England's Japanese allies. But it was Reilly's forays into Russia itself at the time of the Bolshevik Revolution that stand above all else. Virulently anti-Communist, Reilly's plot to topple Lenin very nearly succeeded and his missions did in fact contribute greatly toward the destabilization of the nascent Soviet state. Lured back into the USSR the proverbial once too often, however, Reilly disappeared in 1924 after undertaking a mission to rescue friends held in Moscow prisons. For many years his exact fate was unknown, but this book reveals the end of this greatest of all spies, and shows that Reilly's final act was a tragedy befitting his reputation and legacy. Truly an amazing man whose life makes for an incredible biography.

Andrew Cook's biography of Sidney Reilly seems to be the final word on this mysterious character, and it is a "must read" for anyone interested in the time period, personalities and themes on which the book focuses. It is clear that the writer did meticulous research, and the book appears to be much more accurate than the previous biographies of this famous international conman/spy. (Throughout his book, Cook corrects many inaccuracies by Robin Bruce Lockhart and other writers.)

The book contains over 850 footnotes. These footnotes are a testament to the author's 10 years of research and to his commitment to helping the reader gain a better grasp of events and personalities from more-or-less a century ago about which the author writes.

Overall, I found this well written history book/biography entertaining. However, in places, I found it too detailed for my liking. Interspersed among the text are copies of (or excerpts from) many letters, reports, etc. While they were good support material for the subjects being written about, they (the ones in English, of course) turned out to be more than I really wanted to read. And the text itself went into - for me - too much minutia at times.

Including all of the book's information was necessary to create the definitive story of an amazing life, so I give the book 5 stars for achieving this purpose. The author did an incredible job. And, although I enjoyed this book, I would have enjoyed it more if it had had less information. This is, of course, a matter of personal taste.

After seeing a episode of History Channel's "Vanishings" on Sidney Reilly, my interest was piqued and I am glad this book finally got a reprint, it was very difficult to track down and it does not disappoint. What a crazy life!

This is an excellent account, scrupulously researched of a truly unusual man. Hard to put down.

Maybe I've mistaken what Cook has written about Sidney George Reilly, but it seems to me that this man (originally Sigmund Rosenblum from a small town in what is now Ukraine) never did any real spying but did a great job of 'creating' a spy. That he was involved with the agency that became MI5 (or MI6) is true but much like his life and war record, he did more to 'piss' off people then to accumulate any 'real' material that helped with the war or to affect the early Soviet Union.

What we have here is a great piece of fiction, Sidney George Reilly, was a poser and grifter and did a great job of convincing people he was something he wasn't. He wasn't a spy, he wasn't a "James Bond" and he wasn't anything but a con man, he was a bigamist,a liar and a gigolo. Had Riley done half of what he said, he would have been killed years before. He became a 'real' spy in 1918, years after he claimed to have been a spy, but never stole of captured any important information.

So why did the Soviet Union want him? Well, he was a supporter (specifically monetarily) of one of, who the OGPU (forerunner of the KGB) considered the most dangerous of the exiled "Whites". Having won the Russian Civil War, Stalin ordered all internal and external 'enemies' eliminated. In the one instance where Reilly dealt with real spies, he was enticed into Russia with a 'ridiculous' plan to overthrow the Soviet government by an agency set-up by the OGPU. There he was interrogated and eventually shot.

So what did he actually accomplish? He was a decent businessman but also went broke more times than not. He lived a lavish life whenever he had money but spent his whole life living some one else's life, he married for money and love (neither working out), and left a legacy of falsehoods. He did make people love him, he was charming and could be good-hearted, but in the end was always out for Reilly. His greatest accomplishment was to create a persona that lived long after him and continues to gain adherents to his pseudo-personality.

The author does some things to dispel his fake 'aura' but never comes out with a statement of how fake everything about and around this man was.

Zeb Kantrowitz

Interesting story of a spy at the beggining of the 2oth century