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Margeretha Geertruida Zelle, better known to history by the exotic, glamorous name of Mata Hari, was a woman who profited greatly from the power of illusion during much of her brief life. Born to a hatter named Adam Zelle and his wife Antje van der Meulen, Mata Hari moved from a financially rewarding but miserable marriage to circus performances to exotic dancing and celebrity to the role of ostensible international spy in an arc that ended tragically in front of a French firing squad.

The original international woman of mystery, Mata Hari is maligned as a spy and a traitor. Having seduced a number of the most powerful men in Europe, she was accused of spying for both Allied and Central Powers during the First World War. Mata Hari’s biography tells a different story. From her remarkable transformation from a captain’s wife and mother in the Dutch East Indies to the most celebrated stage presence in Europe, Mata Hari fought for what she believed in.

As Europe tore itself apart during the First World War, one woman danced and ignored the horror. At least until the truth was exposed. Mata Hari, famed dancer and courtesan, finds herself facing a death sentence for spying, but the British Secret Service makes her an officer she can't refuse. She can avoid a hangman's noose on the condition that she kills a German general. The problem for Mata is that the man in question is the man she loves.