Flirting with Danger: The Mysterious Life of Marguerite Harrison, Socialite Spy

In this colorful account, biographer Wallach (The Richest Woman in the World) relates the life story of one of America’s greatest female spies, Marguerite Harrison (1879–1967). Born to Gilded Age wealth as the daughter of a Baltimore shipping magnate, Harrison volunteered with U.S. Army Intelligence in 1918, offering her services as a spy in Europe since she was fluent French and German. Arriving in Berlin after the Armistice, and with a legitimate cover as a Baltimore Sun reporter, she filed stories for the newspaper and secret dispatches to the U.S. government on the raging fight between German communists and the right-wing Freikorps for control of postwar Germany. She traveled to Moscow in 1920, where she glimpsed Lenin at the opera, interviewed Leon Trotsky, was arrested as a spy by the secret police after a mole in U.S. intelligence leaked one of her reports to the Soviets, briefly turned double agent, and served a harrowing 10 months in the infamous Lubyanka prison. Harrison’s lectures and books about her exploits made her famous, and she founded the Society of Woman Geographers in 1925. Wallach presents the eye-popping action crisply, but struggles to get under the surface of this impressive woman. Still, it’s a remarkable tale of intrigue and daring. (Aug.)