Project Mind Control by John Lisle is a chilling, well-researched nonfiction account that reads like a spy thriller. It delves into the secret history of CIA experiments with disturbing clarity, pulling you into a world of paranoia and real-life intrigue. An eye-opening read for fans of history, espionage, or true crime.

I had heard of Project Mind Control, and was curious to learn more. - so I was thrilled to see this book. Lisle unravels the secrets of Project Mind Control in an engaging narrative. Be prepared to have your mind blown!

Special thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for a free, electronic ARC of this novel received in exchange for an honest review.
Expected publication date: May 20, 2025
Sidney Gottlieb was a chemist for the CIA who was tasked with overseeing the MKULTRA project, which was focused on dangerous and even deadly experiments that included; drugging psychiatric patients and prisoners with LSD to assess the user’s ability to be manipulated, examining new methods of torture in order to obtain information and trying to determine if human minds can be controlled and manipulated through the use of electrode implantation in animal brains. In “Project Mind Control: Sidney Gottlieb, the CIA and the tragedy of MKULTRA”, by writer and historian John Lisle, the darker side of the CIA is examined through recently un-redacted files and documents.
“Control” takes place beginning in the 1950s, near the start of the elusive CIA itself and continues right on through past Gottlieb’s trial and imminent death, in 1997. Through previously unreleased documents and papers, Lisle examines not only Gottlieb’s personal role and influence, but those who supported, condoned and otherwise encouraged the deplorable and immoral human experiments, performed by Gottlieb and others.
It should not be surprising that the CIA (and the government itself) is not exactly always on the up-and-up, as history itself shows (e.x. Watergate), however Lisle shines a very bright light on an agency that participated in manipulative and evil acts, and used “national security” as an excuse to keep such secrets.
I was fascinated by the experiments, the people that created them, and the outcomes (as tragic as they were). There were a lot of CIA-led programs, many with multiple name changes over the years, and a lot of corrupt CIA agents, so “Control” keeps you on your toes, trying to keep track of all the details- but it’s a brave story that needs to be told and I respect Lisle for bringing it to the world.
“Control” is a story that will appeal to anyone with an interest in the inner workings of a government agency, although those who tend toward conspiracy theories should read with extreme caution, as there are many examples that could easily activate these beliefs. Speaking to that specificity, Lisle gives a relatively accurate list of questions at the end of the novel that will allow readers to understand their capacity to be swayed by what they see and hear around them, believing something to be true without proof. Pertinent, sharp and dangerous, “Control” reveals many of the deadly plots kept secret by the CIA- until now.

This was a chilling deep dive into the CIA’s infamous MK ULTRA program, where the U.S. government’s obsession with psychological warfare led to a series of ethically bankrupt experiments. This read much like something out of a dystopian sci-fi. Lisle excavates declassified files and civil rights depositions, revealing the gruesome reality of human experimentation hidden behind redacted reports and incinerated evidence.

Lisle’s research presents a harrowing portrait of government overreach, where national security was used as a pretext for psychological torture. This book not only recounts a disturbing historical truth but serves as a grim warning about the dangers of power in the hands of those who believe themselves righteous. A solid piece of nonfiction to say the least.

I am fascinated with anything involving the CIA and Sidney Gottlieb and really enjoyed Project Mind Control. This book is so well researched and well written, and you can tell the care that Lisle put into creating it. This book would serve as a great introduction to those wanting to learn more about MKULTRA and how it affected so much of Cold War America.

Fascinating and very informative
Project Mind Control explores the history of CIA efforts to develop techniques to control the behavior of and gain information from a wide spectrum of people. There were so many varied fascinating and surprising incidents in this book that it is hard to give examples, but they ranged from taking poisons to the Congo for the purpose of assassinating Patrice Lumumba to learning that Fidel Castro was a scuba diver to giving prisoners who participated as subjects in some MKULTRA projects their choice of either reduced sentences or heroin as payment (Most chose heroin!) to plans to use cats as mobile spy devices in order to listen in on a cat-loving Asian head of state. As you might guess from these examples, the book made me want to laugh and to cry.
As you probably can glean from the examples, the book covers much more CIA activity than merely MKULTRA. The title and book description may lead readers to expect a more narrowly focused book, but if you go in with an open mind, you will not be disappointed! CIA wanted to develop good methods to extract information from a subject as well as to prevent such extractions from our own people. They also wanted improved techniques for controlling a subject’s actions. Many of these were very science-based, using experts from other federal agencies as well as CIA, but low-tech techniques such as sex were also found to be successful.
Although the focus is on the research and the techniques tested, the book is more character-driven than I had expected, with interesting insights into the researchers and their targets. Indeed, many of these were definitely characters!
By the way, kudos to the author for the impressive research that produced this book. CIA and similar records are not exactly easy sources to acquire.
I received an advance review copy of this book from NetGalley and St. Martins Press.

This book covers the MKULTRA projects (there were more than 100) that included using drugs for mind control and including assassination strategies by the CIA. The so-called researchers were reckless resulting in the death of one candidate that was covered up, and administered drugs to public health clinic patients, jail inmates and had prostitutes drug their clients. Their behavior was in violation of the Nuremberg laws. Former president Gerald Ford passed legislation to provide more oversight of CIA activities but these protections were rolled back during the Bush administration. The US government was conducting surveillance of its citizens which was reported in 2013 by Edward Snowden. At the same time, prisoners in Guantanamo Bay were being tortured. This book is a hard read as the information is disturbing,

My thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for an advance copy of this book about the CIA's efforts to learn the secrets of the mind, and how scruples, ethics, moraliity and even basic humanity can be tossed aside, if one is given a reason to belive, like patriotism.

I am not sure how I started reading books on conspiracy. I know it was before The X-Files premired as much of what they talked about was old hat to me. Maybe it was after I discovered the Prisoner a show even after 50 years still holds up in the current surveillance state we live in. More likely I probably grabbed a book at a book sale thinking it was fiction, and down the rabbit hole I went. I must confess to a certain amount of naivety when I first starting looking at these books. Who, I thought could keep a secret this long. And why? As I read more history I began to find out the many of the things I doubted were true. Lost nuclear bombs, biological agents set free on subways, all sorts of things that put humans at risk in the name of protecting us. A chance comment by my Dad made this much clearer. I don't know who we were discussing, maybe someone in the family, maybe in the neighborhood. My Dad said, "People can be awfully stupid and awfully evil if they think they are doing the right thing." This comment ran through my head quite a lot while reading this book. For that's what these people were doing, all for the American Way. Project Mind Control: Sidney Gottlieb, the CIA, and the Tragedy of MKULTRA by John Lisle, is a book about a man, a plan, the Cold War, paranoia, and the sureness that everything they were doing was for the benefit of the American people, even if they broke laws, killed people, and made the people they were protecting question everything they knew.

The book is both a histoy of MKULTRA, a plan to determine if one could control spies, soldiers, diplomats and anyone, with drugs or other means, and a biography on the man at the center of it Sidney Gottlieb. Gottlieb was a man of many interests, dance, chemistry, acting in theater, even though he had both a limp and a stutter. Gottlieb was also a man with little in the way of medical ethics, a man who desperately wanted to fit in with others, and would go to great lengths to do so. At the start of the Cold War, people in intelligence began to fear that the red menace had a way of breaking people, making them do things they wouldn't do ordinairily. Drugs, medical procedures, no one was sure. But brain washing was a fear. And when people are afraid, and have lots of money and power, act rashly. Gottlieb was put in charge of a program to find a miracle drug, and figure out how to tell if a human had been corrupted. One idea was LSD, which was having some marvelous effects with alcholoism and deprssion. The CIA arranged to buy a lot of LSD from its manufactuers, and this is were things get trippy. Tests were done on agents, coworkers, prisioners, and soon unknowing people, who were observed, taped and in many cases forgotten. Until the enivitible happened, and the highs crashed to the ground.

Much of the writing is from transcripts of a trial held in the 80's trying to get restitution from the CIA for damages done, so the words actually come from Gottlieb himself. I have read other books about MKULTRA, but this gives a clearer view of Gottlieb, who is usually portrayed as a distant character, since much in the way of records were destroyed. I reall enjoyed this book, well enjoyed because I learned much, but still with that feeling of disgust that people have not changed at all. Give them a bit of authoriry or a belief and they will break laws, hurt others, and still say they are protecting people. Lisle is a very good writer, and makes everything clear and flow well. I really liked the way the book was laid out and told, and learned quite a bit.

There have been a lot of books about the CIA, and its actions during the Cold War. This book really looks at the human factor. The humans who were hurt, the humans who did the hurting and why they did so. Belief is a heck of a drug, one I think many strive for, and does explain why certain things are being allowed, even as I type. Lisle does a very good job presenting that also. A very well done history that asks a lot of questions, whose answers tells us much of what we are as a nation.

John Lisle (author of The Dirty Tricks Department) has written a thoroughly researched book about the clandestine activities of the CIA, focusing particularly on mind control experiments dubbed MKULTRA.

Lisle doesn’t cover much new information, but backs up what he writes with meticulous attribution. Much of his book is based on the testimony of CIA chemist Sidney Gottlieb, who told all (or nearly all) supposedly because he wanted to unburden his conscience.

I think Lisle has only scratched the surface in pulling back the curtain to reveal the immoral and deadly actions of the CIA. A similar book, CIA Rogues and the Killing of the Kennedys, by Patrick Nolan, goes into an equally detailed examination of MKULTRA. While Nolan credits MKULTRA for controlling Sirhan Sirhan to act as Bobby Kennedy’s assassin, Lisle stops short of attributing any success to the mind control experiments.

Favorite Quote: Within the CIA, there existed a group of personnel that plotted the assassination of foreign leaders. Insiders flippantly referred to this group as the “Health Alteration Committee.” Just as flippantly, they referred to its work as “wet affairs” because it concerned the liquidation of people.

I once was naïve, believing the United States Government was overall noble and good. I once was skeptical of conspiracy theories. Was I persuaded by propaganda, a form of mind control?

Thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for the advance reader copy of this book.

Pre-order now on Amazon. Available May 20, 2025.

@JohnLisle @StMartinsPress

#CIA #mindcontrol #NetGalley #SidneyGottlieb #MKULTRA #LSD

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Alright, Project Mind Control is a wild, disturbing dive into the CIA’s MKULTRA program, where Sidney Gottlieb basically played mad scientist with real people. John Lisle lays out the experiments—LSD dosing, sensory deprivation, mind-control attempts—like a true-crime thriller, except it’s all horrifyingly real. The writing is sharp, well-researched, and packed with firsthand accounts that make the whole thing even more unsettling.

It’s a gripping but deeply messed-up read that’ll have you side-eyeing your tap water and questioning every government experiment ever. Proceed with caution—and maybe a tinfoil hat.

Project Mind Control is a fascinating and well-researched exploration of psychological manipulation and covert influence. The author does a great job of breaking down complex concepts with real-world examples, making it both engaging and thought-provoking. It’s the kind of book that keeps you thinking long after you’ve finished, challenging the way you see power, persuasion, and control in everyday life.

thank you netgalley for an arc of this amazing book.
curious in all things CIA, MKULTRA, FT Dettrick, etc. this is right up my alley with a hint of true cime that can't be left out.
truly feels like this book was written just for me.
far from a textbook style with complicated language it weaved an insane story.
forever thankful i got an arc for this bad boy!

Thank you to the publishers and NetGalley for a copy of this non fiction book.
Well, we have loosely heard of the “stories” or “conspiracies” of the LSD experiments and MKUltra projects before, but this gives the details of the corrupt CIA and the multilayered deception. Let’s be curious, read, look and more importantly, rethink of what you were taught and thought were true.