I won’t say too much about Ben Macintyre’s
Agent Sonya as it’s been reviewed everywhere. I don ‘t think the Old Shanghai Hand or China Hand will find much to argue with on his details and his descriptions of Shanghai and Mukden (Shenyang) are all excellent. One word of warning – read the book, don’t listen to the audio book which Macintyre reads himself – it’s the most mangled Chinese ever and completely unlistenable to anyone familiar with the language.
One thing i was particularly happy to see in the book was Macintyre drawing the linkages between Agnes Smedley, Sonya and the former head of Mi5, then a lowly tobacco company employee, Roger Hollis. I think (see the essay in my book