Tumanov: Confessions of a KGB Agent

This was a marvelously written book. It chronicles KGB agent Oleg Tumanov who is trained from his teenage years to become a KGB spy. This chronicle gives you the other side of an often untold story, putting a human face on the once dreaded KGB. It tells how Oleg was instructed on what to do by the government from the beginning, never finishing University so that it wouldn't be on his record and he could conceal what he studied, to gradually being ship-wrecked, under instructions by an acquaintance in the KGB, and to be labeled as a deserter so he could more easily be able to slip under the radar. It goes all the way up into his adult life, telling how he spied while not spying (just reporting things he saw that he thought would be important). It describes the type of training he had, and how it was so that there would be no record or paper trail to lead him back to the KGB. Without going into too much detail so as not to ruin the story for anyone (and seeing that, as I'm writing this, it's been well over a year since I read it), I would like to conclude that this is a fantastic book. Some parts of it were a bit boring, but for the most part it was a great read and was very fascinating. I found this on accident when I was perusing through my university's library, and I can say that this really gives you a new perspective on the cold war and the sentiments of both sides. It's a marvelous biography, which I can give insurmountable praise, that should be more widely regarded, and I hope this modest review will be a nice stepping point for it.