Real-life figures from the Cold War-era mix with a fictional story based on a group of C.I.A. operatives and their counterparts in the K.G.B., MI6, and the Mossad.

Spy vs. spy. Three Yale grads, class of 1954, join their respective countries' secret service. We follow them for 40 years - through the outing of a British spy, the Hungarian revolution, the Bay of Pigs, the scent of moles, and the collapse of the USSR. Fictional characters - Yalies Jack McCauliffe, Leo Kritzky, and Yevgeny Tsipin and Jack's boss Harvey Torriti - rub shoulders with real figures like Kim Philby and James Angleton to tell stories of romance, intrigue, double-crosses, false leads, suicide, execution, and exile - in the name of ideology, patriotism, paranoia, perfidy, and one-upsmanship. Can the CIA claim any credit in the West's Cold War triumph?—<[email protected]>