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It's the stuff or movies and Maury Povich exclusives: My husband is a spy! Bina Cady
Kiyonaga marries a man named Joe from Hawaii and settles into a happily married life with
five kids. Just like any normal family, they go through the years experiencing a lot of
the wonderful and tragic things that most families experience. However, thanks to Dad's
job, they are also privy to the insecurities and drama that comes when your head of
household is a spy, a CIA operative who sets his family into an emotional tailspin with
every new position. MY SPY: Memoir of a CIA Wife is a look into one man's unconventional
occupation and the way it affects the life of the woman closest to him.
The book reads the way you might expect --- a confessional voice laced with "Gee, I
can't believe..." After a while, you just wish that Kiyonaga would find another way
to express her disbelief over all that went on. Even Carmela Soprano has complex and
urgent thoughts about what she learns to accept in her position as wife of someone who
does a lot of stuff that no one else can know about --- Kiyonaga seems like a wide-eyed
child still after all these years. You don't learn all that much about what the CIA does,
except that it's secretive. You don't know all that much about Kiyonaga either, really ---
times were hard, times got better, she was there for her man. Not the stuff that legendary
memoirs are made of.
MY SPY is really most interesting when the narrative changes environment --- the different
places that Bina and Joe are sent to are exotic and require an exciting change in
lifestyle that even Kiyonaga's bland style can't dampen. There are details here worth
exploring, unlike a lot of the specifically CIA situations that can't be explored
properly.
If you have an interest in the CIA or love someone who does, this may be a good read for
you. Otherwise, MY SPY falls quite short in the dramatics category.
--- Reviewed by Jana Siciliano
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