"This is not a woe-is-me memoir of the sort so much in fashion these days, but a carefully reported, almost clinical account of what it is like to live in a totalitarian state and how hard it is to escape from it.... Marton made her first visit to the AVO [Hungarian secret police] archives several years ago. She was met by Katalin Kutrucz, head of the archives, who brought out the 'hundreds of pages of our family file' and, 'reading my thoughts,' said: 'Everybody in your circle, whether your parents trusted or did not trust them, was informing on them. That was just the way it was.' It was a state that institutionalized informing as a way of life.... It's a terrific story, and Marton tells it very well. She deeply admires her parents but doesn't romanticize them or try to explain away their penchant for dangerous risk-taking. She isn't sure that either of them would like the book, as they didn't like their secrets told, but the reader surely will feel, as I do, that it is a powerful tribute to them."—Washington Post Book World