In The Book of Honor, Ted Gup uncovered some of the CIA's closest-held secrets: the names and stories of the seventy-one undercover operatives who were killed in the line of duty. Now he turns his attention to a broader range of American institutions, exposing how and why they keep secrets from the very people they are supposed to serve. Drawing on original reporting and startling analysis, Gup argues that a preoccupation with secrets has undermined the very values-security, patriotism, privacy, the national interest-in whose name secrecy is so often invoked.

Gup shows how the expanding thicket of classified information leads to the devaluation of the secrets we most need to keep, and that journalists have become pawns in the government's internal conflicts over access to information. He explores the blatant exploitation of privacy and confidentiality in academia, business, and the cour ts, and concludes that in case after case, these principles have been twisted to allow the emergence of a shadow system of justice, unaccountable to the public.

Drawing on Gup's decades of work as an investigative reporter, NATION OF SECRETS will shake our faith in some of our most trusted institutions, piercing the veil of secrecy to reveal an alarming new threat to democracy in America. Gup presents a vision radical in its clarity, conservative in its roots, of a country teetering on the brink of losing its identity.

"Nation of Secrets is an eye-opening and very important book. Ted Gup provides many new illustrations of the excesses of governmental and corporate secrecy—but he also does something even more significant. He connects hundreds of items from the news of recent years into a pattern that shows how unbalanced America's approach to secrecy has become. I thought I was familiar with the issues Ted Gup addresses, but I learned something from every chapter of this book."
--James Fallows, correspondent for The Atlantic Monthly

"A generation ago, 'the public's right to know' was a U.S. media cliché, but today's silence is deafening. Nation of Secrets explains why."
--Kevin Phillips, New York Times bestselling author of American Theocracy

"Nation of Secrets brilliantly illuminates the landscape of secrecy in which we live. In a perceptive account illustrated with vivid case studies, Ted Gup shows how secrecy is corrupting our institutions and squandering our democratic heritage. Before the tide of secrecy overwhelms the tools of self-government, this gripping book may prompt readers to ask: Is a nation of secrets what we really want to become?"
--Steven Aftergood, Project on Government Secrecy, Federation of American Scientists

"Nation of Secrets sounds the alarm about America's frightening turn toward excessive secrecy and makes the case with powerful reporting and a diligent, fair-minded toughness. Ted Gup is a national treasure—a shoe-leather reporter with the highest ethical standards and a passion for truth. He has no ax to grind, which makes the book's message all the scarier."
--Alex Jones, Director, Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University