“What we’re offered in Secret Agent Man is a singular mind at work, nimbly and deftly traversing history, archaeology, geography, photography, psychoanalysis, literature, personal narrative, and indeed personal mythology. Witnessing Margot Singer make these intricate connections is exhilarating, and even more so because her writing is so grounded—in the body, in place, in a human life fully lived. I read this book slowly, because I kept rereading whole paragraphs for their pleasures: image, metaphor, music.”