Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
The rediscovered memoir of an American gossip columnist turned amazingly brilliant reporter (The New York Times Book Review) as she reports from the frontlines of the Spanish Civil War and World War II Virginia Cowles was just twenty-seven when she decided to transform herself from a society columnist into a foreign press correspondent. Looking for Trouble is the story of this transformation, as Cowles reports from both sides of the Spanish Civil War, London on the first day of the Blitz, Nazi-run Munich, and Finland's bitter, bloody resistance to the Russian invasion. Cowles also met Hitler (an inconspicuous little man), Mussolini, Winston Churchill, the Mitford sisters, and Ernest Hemingway. Her reportage blends sharp political analysis with a gossip columnist's chatty approachability and a novelist's empathy.
Cowles understood in 1937--long before the average politician--that fascism in Europe was a threat to democracy everywhere. Her insights are as piercing and relevant to today's extremism as they were seventy years ago.