Time magazine called her “a blonde Bond…a Mara Hari from Minnesota who, under the codename Cynthia, used the boudoir as Ian Fleming’s hero uses a Berretta.” OSS chief General “Wild Bill” Donovan said she was “the greatest unsung heroine” of the Second World War.
She was Betty Pack, and her story has been virtually unknown – until now. In The Last Goodnight: A World War II Story of Espionage, Adventure, and Betrayal (Harper, 2016), Vanity Fair contributing editor and New York Times bestselling author Howard Blum reconstructs the riveting life of the beautiful American debutante-turned-spy. It is a breathtaking adventure tale of stolen secrets, seduction, and sex, told with the unrivaled narrative gifts of Blum, who The Daily Beast says “has a remarkable talent for both uncovering history’s most inexplicably forgotten stories….and for writing non-fiction paced like a big-budget thriller.”
Blum will discuss The Last Goodnight on Thursday, Mar. 2 at Congregation Shir Shalom in Ridgefield, part of the synagogue’s Cultural Arts Series. The program is co-sponsored by the Federation for Jewish Philanthropy of Upper Fairfield County and the Jewish Book Council.
A Redding resident, Blum was nominated twice for a Pulitzer Prize for investigative reporting while at the New York Times. He has tapped a trove of recently unclassified files to resurrect Betty Pack’s remarkable story. Recruited first by Britain’s MI-6, and then the American OSS, Pack was the ultimate “swallow”—the trade name for a female agent who uses sex as a weapon. Indeed, Pack’s handlers quickly realized that her biggest asset as a spy was her willingness to employ her sexuality, manipulating men of influence and power who fell prey to her considerable charms. “Cynthia” seduced diplomats and military men from Europe to South America to gain access to codes, ciphers, and secrets. Her espionage achievements include obtaining Polish notebooks that proved key to Alan Turing’s success in deciphering the “unbreakable” messages sent by Germany’s Enigma machines, securing Italian naval ciphers (by seducing an Italian naval attaché) that helped the Royal Navy triumph over Mussolini’s forces at sea, and sneaking into the French Embassy in Washington to break into a safe and photograph Vichy naval codes. Percolating beneath the surface of these acts of daring and peril, however, lurks the story of a woman troubled by the very traits that made her so successful as a spy: a lack of emotional connections and a readiness to risk everything.
As USA Today said of his New York Times bestseller, Dark Invasion, Blum “will move you to the edge of your seat with the facts alone, but the author’s suspenseful detective-mystery narrative is what keeps you there.” The Last Goodnight is a dazzling, panoramic work of history and biography, and a portrait of an extraordinary heroine whose contribution to The Good War has long been overlooked.
The program is co-sponsored by the Federation for Jewish Philanthropy of Upper Fairfield County and the Jewish Book Council and is free and open to the community. Bring your own lunch; a special “top secret treat” will be served.
The Last Goodnight: A World War II Story of Espionage, Adventure and Betrayal with author Howard Blum: Thursday, Mar. 2, 12 noon-2 PM, Congregation Shir Shalom, 46 Peaceable St., Ridgefield | Info/registration: info@ourshirshalom.org / (203) 438-6589