I admit that I couldn't put this book down, but it drove me CRAZY!!!!! because Moran validates, on almost every page, the chauvinism and prejudices and policies of the CIA that her book is a diatribe against. By the time she resigns, I felt physically relieved that she was no longer working for American intelligence. And, as my friend Cat Withrow put it, if she's so darned smart, why is her prose so darned mediocre?

On the inside cover, James Bradford says the book gave a candid insight that shows “that the ‘real’ life of a CIA spy is far from that portrayed by Hollywood.” If Moran’s book is any indication, I would say that’s no doubt true – the ‘real’ life is apparently much more whiny and, well, boring. But, of course, who out there *really* didn’t expect that to be the case? Obviously, Ms. Moran expected more “James Bond” and “Harriet the Spy”, as this is what she gives credit to as her source of inspira...

I love this disarming, straightforward memoir of what it's like to be young, female, and working for the CIA. At times the author seems sort of frivolous and self-indulgent, but that's precisely what makes it so different than all the other intelligence memoirs out there, and fantastically readable. It's a great read and a lot of fun.It's also an interesting glimpse of the reasons an entrenched, warped bureaucracy is not tolerated by people in my generation (Moran was born in 1969) the way it wa...

I appreciated the matter-of-fact, almost cynical tone of this memoir. I think Moran captures the way it feels to walk the tightrope between the altruistic "helping-my-nation" sense of purpose and the cog-in-the-machine sense of purposelessness that goes with working for the government. I can't say I'm surprised by the stuff in here that borders on absurd... but maybe was hoping her experiences wouldn't be so predictable or mundane. But that was the point.

I loved this book. Moran nails the inner turmoil that one has with the Agency. It is a love hate relationship perpetually that she captures. From the very get go, recruitment and benign instructions starts candidates off in a wilderness of mirrors. Self doubt, peer doubt, honor doubt. It is a life of questions and uneasiness. There is no HR rep to call, no manager to chat with. Unless you are on the inside, you will never know what it is like---unless of course you read Lindsay Moran's account.

This is the story of the author's 5-year employment as a CIA case officer. Most of the book describes the training she had to go through and her decision to work for the CIA. She is eventually assigned to Skopje, Macedonia in '2000-'2003.The author eloquently describes life in the CIA at "grunt level" as a foot soldier dealing with hidebound bureaucracy and sleazy situations. It did not in the least glamorize the life of a spy. In fact it made it seem downright miserable. One can understand from...

Blowing My Cover – My Life As A CIA Spy, by Lindsay Moran, was a quick, cheap ($6.50) read that we discussed at Book Club (B/C). It details Ms. Moran’s initial attraction to, training for, and ultimate disillusionment with The Company. The author comes across, I’m sorry to say, as a naïve, Peace Corps-flaky lefty, who for some reason feels compelled to join the CIA. Well, she believes herself drawn to lying and travel, so she must be perfect for intelligence work! All that said, her observations...

This is certainly no James Bond novel. James Bond novels involve villains plotting to take over the world. This book starred a woman who was plotting to take over my last nerve.I was expecting some joking/ridicule of the CIA from this book. She painted the CIA more like "The Office" filled with horribly incompetent agents - especially herself.She comes across as whiny and I felt more like I was reading a Sex and the City episode with Lindsay so preoccupied with rock climbing, boyfriends and qual...

Meh. Just another reminder to NOT read books with cartoonish jacket cover art.

If you were to write a book about the most money-wasting governmental agency what kind of tone would you write with? Lindsay Moran made the right choice: heavy-duty sarcasm.

I found this book mildly enjoyable. It was a quick read which helped. The author tells amusing stories. She has a way of making light of what could be serious situations. But all in all, I couldn't help but think about the Mrs. Pollifax books. The author tells about how she wanted to be a spy as a child and how she was certain that her father and grandfather were spies before her. She had a couple "false starts" where she was in the application process, but then backed out. She enjoyed most of t...

Ms. Moran is a good writer, and she does best describing the training of potential operatives at The Farm, as the CIA training facility is known colloquially. Training is in many ways not as intensive as I expected - only five days of hand-to-hand combat, and the firearms proficiency test is a mere written exam. However other requirements, such as the hostage scenario and defensive driving course, not to mention parachuting out of a plane while loaded down with gear, seem designed to test the me...

I'm giving this book the full 3 stars because it probably portrays a truer picture of the CIA than anyone has dared to do. Lindsay Moran's undercover work involved riding a bicicyle around Skopje, Macedonia, sitting in cars with old Balkan men, listening to them drone on and on about history and paying them astronomical fees for so much nonsense, and then, finally, picking up strange Bulgarian men she's far too chic to marry. This doesn't seem to make readers of spy thrillers, Lindsay Moran hers...

Lindsay Moran's account of her harrowing recruitment for the CIA, training that bordered on the absurd, then her work in Eastern Europe changed a lot of the ideas I had about the organization. Though she reiterates several times that being a case officer is very different from what one would think from the movies, the skills she learns (detecting and shaking a tail, never using a land line, disguises, and dead drops, to name a few) are pretty dramatic. She writes of an organization that is so ti...

Blowing My Cover offers an inside look at America's recent failures of intelligence, the CIA, and its tragic missteps in the Iraq war. Moran, a disenchanted CIA case officer between 1998 and 2003, relates her (mis)adventures with wit and intelligence-she's an unglamorous Bond Girl with Bridget Jones's sensibilities. Most critics embraced Moran's personal approach-her honest, humorous descriptions of grueling training (defensive driving, assembling explosives, handling weapons) and journey toward...

While this book was an interesting and entertaining read, the writing was only average. The book interested me because I have personally seen someone go through the process of applying to the CIA. I can appreciate Moran's disillusionment and the shattering of it, but she had some interesting stories that I think she could have told in an even more riveting manner. I also found myself questioning how much of her stories were true or were omitted. It seems to me that a agency known for its secrecy...

I liked this book, mainly for the insider's glimpse into what it's like to be a CIA agent--and a female one at that--in more current times. I wasn't so crazy about the author herself ("Gee, should I take the CIA's job offer or that Fullbright scholarship?" Decisions, decisions). But I did feel for her plight, especially when she was overseas. I now have a better sense of what's at stake with an agent's cover, and, apropos to recent news, also have more insight into how *really bad* it was for Va...

This was fast reading, but it wasn't until after I finished it that I realised that it was fast reading because there wasn't very much in it. I guess the main problem I had with the narrative was that she came up with a bunch of stories about why the CIA was boring. However, inasmuch as the names and locations have been changed, not only was the book filled with boring stories, the boring stories weren't, presumably, even true. So I guess... life in the CIA is boring... kinda like this book.

Lindsay Moran has a funny, dry sense of humor and a very accessible writing style. Recounting her days as a CIA spy and as a spy-in-training, her story is alternatively hilarious, outrageous and revealing. This inside look at the CIA will absolutely make you shake your head in disbelief at the tremendous waste of resources that go into being the nation’s first line of defense.

It kinda surprises me how much Lindsay was able to reveal about the CIA. Very good read, makes me greatful I never wanted o be a spy or any other job that would separate me from my family so much.

We get to know:How much Lindsay Moran wanted to be an agent, how some of her family were connected to US government. How CIA agents are trained.What happened when she actually became an agent.Ultimately Moran found the costs too high, so she had to quit. Indon't blame her. But drars I would have liked to have had more stories about actually being in the field.Readable. Sometimes Entertaining.

Not a well written book...

This non-fiction book details the experiences of Lindsay Moran, a former CIA agent who spent her childhood dreaming of being a spy and finally got to see her dreams fulfilled when she was hired shortly after graduating college. However, after a grueling training and the crippling toll the Agency put on her personal life, Moran learns that sometimes achieving your childhood dreams isn’t what it’s cracked up to be, and the sexed-up portrayal of spies in popular culture is a far cry from reality. W...

A quick, interesting read that was also slightly alarming. The CIA wastes a LOT of money so that case officers, such as Moran, can wine and dine those they want to ply secrets from. These informants get paid salaries plus "signing bonuses". While I don't argue that their job is not important, I find it hard to believe all the informants on the CIA's payroll are totally necessary to national security. Moran was instantly put off by the fact that her job was to find the informant's vulnerabilities...

I certainly picked this book up as a light read, but it was lighter than I thought it would be. The book, ostensibly a memoir, focuses on the author's isolation during her 5-year career as a CIA case operator. She seems very normal, which makes it easy to relate to her, but I didn't think the book said anything new or different about the CIA or about the people in the CIA. I say this is ostensibly a memoir because I'm skeptical about how much was left out. I know the CIA had to approve the book

I’d like to blame my father for my addiction to James Bond. But even more than an affinity for tall dark men with English accents, thanks to Bond I’ve always secretly wanted to be a spy. So when I came across "Blowing My Cover: My Life as a CIA Spy" by Lindsay Moran I couldn’t resist.I was expecting some kind of Valerie Plame memoir about a CIA cover gone bad, but I was wonderfully surprised. This is more of a "CIA approved" version of Lindsay Moran’s daily journal about what its REALLY like to

Lindsay Moran begins her memoir explaining her motivations for wanting to work for the CIA in the first few pages of the book, but her motivations, at first passionate, begin to dwindle as she starts training for her career as a CIA case officer.Lindsay continues to document how she feels working for the CIA throughout this memoir, which covers her five-year term from beginning training, to working in the field, and her feelings are the focus. The reader does learn interesting facts, such as tha...

I love this disarming, straightforward memoir of what it's like to be young, female, and working for the CIA. At times the author seems sort of frivolous and self-indulgent, but that's precisely what makes it so different than all the other intelligence memoirs out there, and fantastically readable. It's a great read and a lot of fun. I appreciated the matter-of-fact, almost cynical tone of this memoir. I think Moran captures the way it feels to walk the tightrope between the altruistic "helping...

Lindsay Moran grew up wanting to be Harriet the Spy; unlike most former little girls, she made it, becoming a CIA case officer in 1998 and spending several years with the Agency until she just couldn't take it anymore. Blowing My Cover is the story of that journey.Moran's voice is breezy and informal, and the recounting of her misadventures sounds much like "Stephanie Plum Goes to Quantico". She takes us through her induction, testing and training (which comes off as the adventure camp from hell...

I love this disarming, straightforward memoir of what it's like to be young, female, and working for the CIA. At times the author seems sort of frivolous and self-indulgent, but that's precisely what makes it so different than all the other intelligence memoirs out there, and fantastically readable. It's a great read and a lot of fun.Lindsay Moran's account of her harrowing recruitment for the CIA, training that bordered on the absurd, then her work in Eastern Europe changed a lot of the ideas I...