Six Car Lengths Behind an Elephant: Undercover & Overwhelmed as a CIA Wife and Mother

Imagine being married to a spy. Imagine keeping the big secret and moving your family from country to country to country. How does it all work? In this entertaining memoir, Lillian McCloy shares stories from her life as the wife of an undercover CIA officer. It's an eye-opening and often humorous tale about the CIA, marriage, family, secrets, friendships, international adventures, and the meaning of home.

ENDORSEMENTS:

"A charming and unusual portrait of the secret life."
–JOHN LE CARRE´, author of The Spy Who Came in from the Cold and Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

"Lillian McCloy reveals the intrigue, danger, and humor of clandestine life in her thoroughly entertaining account of a CIA family's nomadic lifestyle. Few living in the U.S. will ever encounter the unique trials and tribulations of the McCloy family, but what a fascinating read it is!"
–ALAN B. TRABUE, CIA (Ret.), author of A Life of Lies and Spies

"Six Car Lengths Behind an Elephant is an elegant, and unusually moving, memoir of the wife of CIA officer under what's known as 'nonofficial cover'; that is, those intelligence officers who work abroad as a businessman, without the protections and comforts that diplomatic status provides. But it is much more than that—a story of espionage and spycraft; of an American family and its innocence lost; and of the emotional turmoil and psychic journey imposed by a life deep undercover. The depth of its vision and candor into the real-world effects of the espionage life on those closest to it makes it essential reading for anyone interested in an understanding of CIA free from both tendentious polemic as well as whitewashed apologia." 
–ZACH DORFMAN, intelligence journalist and former senior staff writer at the Aspen Institute

"If you're married to a spy, the always fraught arena of a relationship turns into a positive minefield. What does that all-night absence mean? What can you begin to say to the kids? Lillian McCloy gives us the story of a life spent around secret intelligence that is funny and charming and in every wonderful sense, deeply spooky."
–PICO IYER, author of Video Night in Kathmandu and The Art of Stillness