The Widow's Network (Kindle Single)

The New York Times bestselling author of Twelve and The End of Major Combat Operations takes you deep inside an important battle against ISIS and reveals the allied fighters’ most unexpected intelligence assets—which the US government will neither confirm nor deny. When journalist Nick McDonell returned to Iraq in 2016, he sought to better understand the collateral damage of America’s ongoing wars by meeting face-to-face with its besieged survivors. What he found in the ruins of Tikrit, one of the last barriers between ISIS and Baghdad, was a covert alliance of women, embedded against ISIS and fronted by an Iraqi named Wahida, acting as unofficial spies for the US and coalition forces. With her entire family wiped out by ISIS, Wahida has been waging a war of her own—she recruits from the divorce courts of Iraq to find women willing to pose as wives under ISIS rule. The result: air strikes that have liquidated top ISIS figures—and civilians.The Widow’s Network reveals a world where battle lines don’t exist, where risks are incalculable, and where everyday women are playing a major role in defeating one of the most depraved and destructive forces of our time.