Farewell, Sergei Kostin
Farewell, Sergei Kostin
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Farewell
The Greatest Spy Story of the Twentieth Century

Author: Sergei Kostin, Eric Raynaud, Richard V. Allen, Catherine Cauvin-Higgins

Narrator: Arthur Morey

Unabridged: 15 hr 12 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 12/11/2012


Synopsis

1981. Ronald Reagan and François Mitterrand are sworn in as presidents of the Unites States and France, respectively. The tension due to Mitterrand’s French Communist support, however, is immediately defused when he gives Reagan the Farewell Dossier, a file he would later call “one of the greatest spy cases of the twentieth century.”Vladimir Ippolitovitch Vetrov, a promising technical student, joins the KGB to work as a spy. Following a couple of murky incidents, however, Vetrov is removed from the field and placed at a desk as an analyst. Soon, burdened by a troubled marriage and frustrated at a flailing career, Vetrov turns to alcohol. Desperate and needing redemption, he offers his services to the DST. Thus Agent Farewell is born. He uses his post within the KGB to steal and photocopy files of the USSR’s plans for the West—all under Brezhnev’s nose.Probing further into Vetrov’s psychological profile than ever before, Kostin and Raynaud provide groundbreaking insight into the man whose life helped hasten the fall of the Communist Soviet Regime.

About Sergei Kostin

Sergei Kostin is a Russian documentary maker and writer living in Moscow. He is author of four nonfiction books, mainly about secret services, translated into eight languages, including The Man Behind the Rosenbergs and of four spy novels published in Russia, the USA (Paris Weekend), Bulgaria, and Serbia. First published in France in 1997 under the title Bonjour Farewell, Farewell was the fruit of two years of painstaking investigation in Moscow and Paris interviewing the key players and witnesses to this amazing adventure.

About Eric Raynaud

Eric Raynaud is a French film writer who joined up with Sergei Kostin to contribute to Farewell after the release of the film L’Affaire Farewell, starring Willem Dafoe.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Rob on April 04, 2012

interesting story overwritten with too much detail and a clunky translation. abandoned probably 2/5 of the way through.......more

Goodreads review by Ron on August 20, 2018

It was quite ironic to finish this book on the metro in Kyiv, Ukraine. Reading about Vetrov while living in the former USSR brought an incredible dimension to the story. Vetrov was a mole in the KGB, who began sharing intel with the French, when Reagan became President. Many believe he hastened the......more

Goodreads review by James on February 18, 2012

I overall enjoyed this book, but had one principle frustration with it: the continuous foreshadowing. Almost from the first chapter we are told (rather, significantly hinted at) that Vetrov will be caught and executed. As such, some of the storytelling factor of this true story is kind of moot ss al......more

Goodreads review by Adam on August 22, 2013

Short Review: Farewell was a Russian KGB agent that leaked thousands of pages of secret documents to the French. Arguably this leaked information (and its use by Reagan and his security team) did more to bring down the Soviet Union than any other single action. The documents opened up the full exten......more


Quotes

“The reader of this wonderful book from Sergei Kostin and Eric Raynaud is in for a treat: an introduction into what President Reagan described as the most significant spy story of the last century...[an] exciting voyage into the murky world of espionage and counterespionage.” —Richard V. Allen, United States National Security Advisor to President Ronald Reagan“Vetrov is 007’s opposite: a shambolic bear of a man, albeit with the requisite indestructible liver (and penchant for a basement quickie with the secretary).” The Sunday Times