The Devil's Chessboard: Allen Dulles, the CIA, and the Rise of America's Secret Government

An Amazon Best Book of October 2015: Salon.com co-founder David Talbot’s The Devil’s Chessboard paints a riveting but unflattering picture of longtime CIA chief Allen Dulles (and of his Secretary of State brother, John Foster Dulles) in a nonfiction account covering decades of espionage, questionable tactics, and outright conspiracy. Heaping detail after detail into a dense but fast-flowing account, Talbot has written a book that reads like part Cold War history and part Tom Clancy novel. Both brothers protected the rich and powerful. Both felt they could act outside the rules. Both feared the Soviets and would do seemingly anything to oppose them. Readers will be glad these men are gone, even as they drink up every word written about them. And some will wonder if others have quietly taken their place.--Chris Schluep

• JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters
• The Brothers: John Foster Dulles, Allen Dulles, and Their Secret World War
• Mary's Mosaic: The CIA Conspiracy to Murder John F. Kennedy, Mary Pinchot Meyer, and Their Vision for World Peace
• The Third Way: The Nazi International, European Union, and Corporate Fascism
• The Spinning Magnet: The Electromagnetic Force That Created the Modern World--and Could Destroy It
• The Ghost: The Secret Life of CIA Spymaster James Jesus Angleton
• Brothers: The Hidden History of the Kennedy Years
• The Secret Team: The CIA and Its Allies in Control of the United States and the World
• JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters
• Operation Gladio: The Unholy Alliance between the Vatican, the CIA, and the Mafia