'...When crops wave in the breeze, it means that the dog is running through them. You can't catch him until the harvest is almost ending. Then … a ritual slaying to bring good luck...'
Maggie Armitage, visiting Prague on a brashly optimistic market research project, sees her plans collapse when a Russian tank settles itself outside her hotel…
Against a background of violence, she drives towards the border — and acquires as passenger: a Czech archaeologist on the run.
Jan's marriage, too, has been violent and his wife, the vindictive Blanka, has been collaborating with the secret police.
This is the nightmare from which Jan is fleeing — only to find himself still enmeshed in its tentacles…
He falls under deep suspicion in England, the country he has loved and respected for so long.
Jan is carrying a valuable secret, but has no idea why exactly it’s so valuable.
Nothing so crudely melodramatic as an atomic formula or a defence plan … yet when at last he returns to face his enemies in the Czech Republic, it proves even more dramatic than he could ever have guessed…
"Murder, conspiracy, secrets....it's got everything!" - Thomas Waugh
John Burke was born in Rye, Sussex, in 1922 and worked in the publishing industry before becoming an author of novels and short stories. He is best known as the author of the novelisation of the popular musical "Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang," but he also wrote the novelisations of dozens of other stage plays, film and TV scripts.
Maggie Armitage, visiting Prague on a brashly optimistic market research project, sees her plans collapse when a Russian tank settles itself outside her hotel…
Against a background of violence, she drives towards the border — and acquires as passenger: a Czech archaeologist on the run.
Jan's marriage, too, has been violent and his wife, the vindictive Blanka, has been collaborating with the secret police.
This is the nightmare from which Jan is fleeing — only to find himself still enmeshed in its tentacles…
He falls under deep suspicion in England, the country he has loved and respected for so long.
Jan is carrying a valuable secret, but has no idea why exactly it’s so valuable.
Nothing so crudely melodramatic as an atomic formula or a defence plan … yet when at last he returns to face his enemies in the Czech Republic, it proves even more dramatic than he could ever have guessed…
Praise for John Burke
"Murder, conspiracy, secrets....it's got everything!" - Thomas Waugh
John Burke was born in Rye, Sussex, in 1922 and worked in the publishing industry before becoming an author of novels and short stories. He is best known as the author of the novelisation of the popular musical "Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang," but he also wrote the novelisations of dozens of other stage plays, film and TV scripts.
