Ilana Berry
Ilana Berry (Law ’03)
Ilana Berry’s (Law ’03) debut novel, The Peacock and the Sparrow (Simon & Schuster), was named a best book of the year by The New Yorker, NPR, and Diplomatic Courier. The book is about an aging spy caught in the crosswinds of the Arab Spring on the Persian Gulf island of Bahrain. Berry was a spy for the CIA for six years, including one year in wartime Baghdad. She publishes under the pen name I.S. Berry.
Ilana Berry (Law ’03)
Ilana Berry (Law ’03) published her debut spy novel, The Peacock and the Sparrow (Simon & Schuster), in May 2023. Her pen name is I.S. Berry. After spying for the CIA for six years, including one year in wartime Baghdad, Berry decided she preferred writing about espionage to doing it. The Peacock and the Sparrow is about an American spy caught in the crosswinds of the Arab Spring who becomes involved in murder, consuming love, and an unpredictable revolution. Joseph Kanon, bestselling author of The Berlin Exchange, calls it “remarkable” and Joseph Weisberg, creator of the TV series The Americans, calls it “the most realistic espionage story I’ve read.”