“The German Gestapo gave up on him — he was too well-trained to be caught”

An American-born boy who moved to Crete when he was two years old, Helias Doundoulakis experienced a life-changing moment at eighteen, when Adolf Hitler’s elite paratroopers seized control of his land. Still in high school, he joined a resistance organization during the German occupation.

Avoiding capture by the Gestapo, he was evacuated to Cairo, Egypt, where he was recruited by the OSS (Office of Strategic Services) and received six months of spy training. Transformed into an adept and skillful spy, he was sent on a dangerous mission back to Greece, and his reports on German troop movements to OSS Headquarters in Cairo inflicted great losses to the enemy — and silently turned the tide of World War II.

Today, Doundoulakis stands as one of the world’s leading scientists and inventors; one among the few whose signatures are found on two plaques that have been left on the moon by Apollo 11 and Apollo 12.

In I Was Trained To Be A Spy, Doundoulakis boldly revisits the past century as he shares his cinematic life story, in a memoir that features the momentum, tension, and action of a fictional spy thriller. In this sterling volume, the author masterfully narrates his powerful tale of life against imposing odds, and the grim realities of war. It is also a story of transformation, a startling portrait of an ordinary man’s evolution — through the cultivation of inborn strengths and intense training — into a spy of world-class caliber.

Review:

"...Doundoulakis is able to evoke the suspense and thrilling detail of his many narrow escapes and also convey his youthful sense of excitement and adventure. His intimate rendering of the adversity Greek civilians faced during the war is particularly moving....

"...no matter how exceptional his post-war experience, it shrinks in comparison to tales of avoiding the Gestapo behind enemy lines and practicing the arts of intelligence..."

"...Exciting, first-hand account of a World War II spy."

— Kirkus Discoveries, A review service from Kirkus Reviews