Spy the Lie

Former CIA Officers Teach You How to Detect Deception

By: Philip Houston, Michael Floyd, Susan Carnicero, Don Tennant

Narrated by: Fred Berman

Length: 4 hrs and 52 mins

Publisher's summary

Audie Award Nominee, Business and Educational, 2013

Three former CIA officers - among the world’s foremost authorities on recognizing deceptive behavior - share their proven techniques for uncovering a lie.

Imagine how different your life would be if you could tell whether someone was lying or telling you the truth. Be it hiring a new employee, investing in a financial interest, speaking with your child about drugs, confronting your significant other about suspected infidelity, or even dating someone new, having the ability to unmask a lie can have far-reaching and even life-altering consequences.

As former CIA officers, Philip Houston, Michael Floyd, and Susan Carnicero are among the world’s best at recognizing deceptive behavior. Spy the Lie chronicles the captivating story of how they used a methodology Houston developed to detect deception in the counterterrorism and criminal investigation realms, and shows how these techniques can be applied in our daily lives.

Through fascinating anecdotes from their intelligence careers, the authors teach listeners how to recognize deceptive behaviors, both verbal and nonverbal, that we all tend to display when we respond to questions untruthfully. For the first time, they share with the general public their methodology and their secrets to the art of asking questions that elicit the truth.

Spy the Lie is a game-changer. You may never experience another book that has a more dramatic impact on your career, your relationships, or your future.

©2012 Philip Houston, Susan Carnicero, Don Tennant, Michael Floyd (P)2012 Macmillan

You've got more work to do

What did you learn from Spy the Lie that you would use in your daily life?

A great reference on reading people and their comfort level. They don't tell you who's not telling the truth, but they'll teach you when a response is inconsistent with your expectations, indicating you should do a little more work (ask more questions) in that area.

Very interesting but would have liked more data

Very interesting book with multiple good examples, but they felt anecdotal without as much of a quantitative backing as I was expecting. I understand that deception detection and deceptive strategy management are both tremendously complicated topics and at some point you have to go with a qualitative explanation for the sake of brevity so I still give it 4 stars.

This book is a eye opener

Everyone could learn from this book. This book tells how the people who have been trained in Lie Detection use this as a tool for finding out if your lying or not. But one has to open their ears and mind, with practice it will work for you. But be careful do not use this tool if you do not rely want to hear the truth.

never again can I........

never again can I believe a bold face lie even from my own family after learning all the tell signs they give off.

The best book I have ever read!

This book is so interesting I would recommend this to anyone you must read this it is the most well thought out book I have ever read

I will listen muliple times

Very interesting. I have used the theories and they seem to work extremely well. You must give it full concentration while using the theories. I will listen over and over to grasp all the nuances that are taught in this book. I enjoyed this book very much. Well narrated.

Amazing!

Would you listen to Spy the Lie again? Why?

I have listened to it 10 times and I still learn something new each time. I am not in law enforcement but I do many investigations in my line of work. Since reading this book I have been able to Spy the Lies and conclude many of my investigations to the satisfaction of my boss and our clients. Thank you for this informative book and the tools it has given me and the skill it has taught.

What about Fred Berman’s performance did you like?

Very easy to listen too. Thanks Fred good job !!

What insight do you think you’ll apply from Spy the Lie?

The Method

Finally a book that teaches!

What did you love best about Spy the Lie?

Spy the Lie does a great job of using real life examples to prove their strategy in action.

What other book might you compare Spy the Lie to and why?

What Every Body is saying. It helps identify deception in non verbal. The difference, What Every Body is Saying focuses more on body language, while Spy the Lie focuses on all non verbal language.

I can spie the lie

If you could sum up Spy the Lie in three words, what would they be?

More comfort in the commitments of others.

What did you like best about this story?

Concrete analysis of actual cases

What about Fred Berman’s performance did you like?

I could clearly understand him even when driving around in my noisy diesel pick up truck.

If you were to make a film of this book, what would be the tag line be?

Great interrogations

Any additional comments?

Great interrogations.

knowledgeable author...

3.5 stars for story
4 stars for narration

I found the book informative on the subject and the content credible. Diagrams not present in the audio format sometimes presented a challenge in deciphering what was being said.

My biggest complaint in the writing style of the author, was his frequent reference to a subject being discussed, and then saying 'we will study this more in depth in later chapters'. This happened often enough that I started to wonder when we would discuss these subjects, and by the time we did I had forgotten what we were talking about earlier. This may have worked better in written form, but in audio form it became a distraction for me.

My other complaint was that I did not care for the anecdotal style of writing. I would have preferred more hard and fast details about analyzing behavior with specific examples (which did happen often later in the book). In the end, the method was revealed, and there were a number of helpful hints and strategies to help one negotiate such the subtle art of understanding behavioral "tells".

I would recommend this to anyone interested in the subject.