'a convincing and moving historical novel, which is also an
exciting thriller...Sansom...brings the time alive.' -- The Sunday Times

`C.J. Sansom has a good ear for dialogue and the characterisation
is excellent throughout.' -- Sunday Telegraph

An award-winning and highly distinguished documentary film-maker, Leslie Woodhead has written a funny, sad and highly atmospheric memoir of what it was like to be hurled into maturity amidst the peculiar circumstances of the Cold War. In the spring of 1956, like two million other men of his generation, the eighteen-year old Leslie Woodhead received a summons to serve Her Majesty. Charting his progress from the austerity of post-war Halifax, via comically bleak RAF training camps and the grim, isolated Joint Services School for Linguistics, My Life As A Spy takes us finally to Berlin and the front line of the Cold War. In the ruins of a city gripped by espionage and paranoia, Leslie Woodhead discovered adulthood and his vocation as an observer and documenter of people. A slice of Cold War history and a poignant tale of how our lives can be formed by events and experiences we barely comprehend at the time. '[a] delightfully irreverent memoir. . . Woodhead's memories exude a wonderful sense of nostalgia for a world of lost innocence that to anyone over 60 is instantly recognisable' Sunday Times

"With his recent memories of the Kafkaesque world of the cold war frontline, Leslie Woodhead could hardly keep a straight face, and neither will you after reading this delightfully irreverent memoir . . . exudes a wonderful sense of nostalgia for a world of lost innocence" - Sunday Times --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

In 1956, like two million other men of his generation, the eighteen-year old Leslie Woodhead received a summons to serve Her Majesty. An only child, living above a shop in repressed, post-war Halifax, he had grown up with austerity and secrets. But nothing prepared him for comically bleak RAF training camps, or the grim isolation of the joint Services School for Linguistics on the east coast of Scotland. Posted to an ex-Luftwaffe base in war ravaged Berlin, a city gripped by espionage and paranoia, Woodhead was a bemused participant in a little known chapter of Cold War history which was to define his future as an observer and documenter of people. Retracing his teenage steps fifty years later, Leslie has written a highly atmospheric memoir of coming of age during the peculiar circumstances of the early Cold War, and a poignant reflection on how our lives can be formed by events and experiences we don't comprehend at the time.

Born in Glasgow in 1937, Leslie Woodhead is one of Britain's most distinguished documentary film-makers. His pionnering films, often on major Eastern European themes, have won many awards, including a BAFTA and the Royal Television Society award. He has been awarded an OBE for 'services to television'. He lives in Cheshire.