Into the Mirror: The Life of Master Spy Robert P. Hanssen [Hardcover]

Lawrence Schiller (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 30, 2002

For fifteen years, government worker Robert Hanssen passed along to the Soviets over 6,000 pages of top secret and classified information, including information on the U.S. investigation of smuggling nuclear weapons to third world countries and the entire plan for the continuity of the U.S. government if suddenly attacked. This is the story behind the man who so heinously betrayed his country. The book is based on extensive investigative interviews conducted by Lawrence Schiller and Norman Mailer with members of Robert Hanssen's immediate family, his friends, co-workers, past and present Special Agents of the FBI, former agents of the KGB and SUV organs of the Soviet Union and Russian Government, diplomats of the Soviet Union, and past and present members of the Catholic Church and Opus Dei; This is the first book about the convicted spy that gets behind who he really was and what he was really thinking when he decided to betray his country.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Robert Hanssen is due to be sentenced this coming May. Extensive press coverage is planned in the US and UK.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: HarperCollins; 1 edition (April 30, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060508094
• ISBN-13: 978-0060508098
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 5.9 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 2.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (26 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,400,667 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Revenge of the Nerds, July 11, 2002

By 

Christopher B. Jonnes "author of BIG ICE and... (Stillwater, MN United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Into the Mirror: The Life of Master Spy Robert P. Hanssen (Hardcover)

Into the Mirror is deceptively good. My early impression was negative. The choice of fictionalizing the tale was odd, in my opinion. The dialogue was stilted, nerdy, Father-Knows-Bestish. But as I persevered through the book, I finally understood what the author was doing--speaking as Hanssen spoke--and began to appreciate it. In the end, the story resonates strongly.

It's helpful to know what the book isn't before you read it. It is not a detailed analysis of the specific criminal activities of Robert P. Hanssen, master spy. You won't learn the nitty-gritty on what secrets were passed to whom and when. Instead, Into the Mirror is a glimpse into the psyche of Hanssen himself; how he grew up; how he thought; how he wound up as a spy.

Part of the frustration in reading the book was that fictional tales generally require a likeable central character. Hanssen is not, and Schiller--properly--makes no apparent attempt to make him so. Once the reader accepts the notion that the protagonist is a weird, perverted traitor with few redeeming qualities, the reading gets easier.

The fascinating aspect of the story is that the trail leading Hanssen to spy for the Soviets and Russians against the U.S. wasn't littered with the kind of political travesties one would expect. Hanssen wasn't the victim of capitalism gone bad, or Rodney Kingesque mistreatment. His parents weren't ultra-liberals, communists, anti-American, or even particularly political. His father, though overbearing and mildly abusive, was a big-city cop. Hanssen was a converted Catholic who appeared to love his country and excel at his job. He was just your average schlep with a money management problem. This led to his first sale of classified secrets for cash, which quickly led to a near-clinical compulsion to spy for the pure excitement of it.

Into the Mirror reveals a strange man with unquenchable and unsavory sexual tendencies (allowing his best friend to secretly watch him make love to Mrs. Hanssen), and a twisted value system that somehow allowed espionage (which he knew led to the deaths of several men) to coexist with Catholicism. Oddly, we see a man who, but for an errant fork in life's road, could have easily been a patriot and contributing FBI agent. --Christopher Bonn Jonnes, author of Wake Up Dead.

15 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Quick moving, enlightening and masterful, May 31, 2002

By 

Joel L. Gandelman (San Diego, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Into the Mirror: The Life of Master Spy Robert P. Hanssen (Hardcover)

Into the Mirror moves at such a break-neck pace that this book should be arrested for breaking the literary speed limit. Some may (and do) quibble about the fact this is a docudrama -- a dramatization of a true, high profile news story -- but it is FUN, a can't-put-it-down read and highly enlightening.

I"ve read many books this year but I will say in all seriousness: this was one of the most enjoyable, compelling books I've read all year. The story centers on FBI Special Agent Robert Philip Hanssen, whose arrest on Feb 2001 on 15 counts of espionage pitchforked him into the headlines. I read many of the complicated, sometimes dry news reports -- but this book makes it REAL. So when I heard he was sentenced in May to life imprisonment I had a MUCH different reaction than I would have if I had not read this book.

The reason: when you hear about a spy case like this you wonder "how could he do this? He just wanted the money?" and it ends in puzzlement.

Schiller's book, based on many interviews done by Schiller and Norman Mailer, and using Mailer's mini-series screenplay as a guide, really brings the story alive. It's as dramatic as
watching a top flight film or mini-series and more instructive than all the news reports I read on this put together. How did Hanssen get from Point A (an innocent child) to Point
B (one of the most destructive spys in American history and only the third FBI agent ever accused of spying)? This book provides some of the answers.

There are a slew of revelations you'll find here that explain why. Just a few: constant abuse by his policeman father (lasting into adulthood); his almost sexual thrill at deception
and betrayal; the fun he had changing his grades in school; his betrayal of his wife, church, stated religious beliefs and best friend; his siphoning of gas out of FBI cars; his constant
problem with credit card debt and economic dependence on his gloating father. There are too many to go into here.

The book makes sense of the whole chronology (included in the back of the book) ...and in the end you feel you KNOW Hanssen. He's NOT sympathetic. You still feel outrage. But some puzzlement turns to pity. Hanssen was a master spy and Into the
Mirror is a master docudrama.

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars FBI Master Spy- A Shameful True Life Tale, June 4, 2002

By 

James E. Carroll (Cape Cod, Massachusetts, United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Into the Mirror: The Life of Master Spy Robert P. Hanssen (Hardcover)

Lawrence Schiller's "Into the Mirror" is a riveting, page-turning expose into the secret life of FBI agent turned spy, Robert P. Hanssen. Hanssen's misdeeds and treason are depicted in a researched and documented book that conveys the dark side of betraying one's country. Schiller attempts to explain Hanssen's duplicity by creating a psychological picture of a very complex individual using literary license in an effective and believable manner. For those who do not want "just the facts" but seek some sort of explanation for Hanssen's betrayal of the USA, Schiller's book is the right stuff.

Schiller portrays Hanssen's life as full of contradictions; from his dogmatic membership in the Catholic society, Opus Dei, to his prurient pornographic pursuits; from his rise in the ranks of the FBI's prestigious counterintelligence squad to his indictment for espionage. Never before has the nation seen a traitor like Robert P. Hanssen gain access to the halls of justice masquerading as a protector of liberty all the while posing as Ramon for his Moscow handlers. We can only hope that it will never happen again.

I read this book in two short sittings finding myself pulled into Schiller's portrayal of Hanssen's clandestine life. You have to feel sorry for Hanssen's family for the pain and disgrace he brought on them, but you will feel no sympathy for Hanssen himself who you learn from the text took up spying to pay off credit card bills and live a more lavish lifestyle. Hanssen will never see in his mirror the face of a patriot.