by Mark Ellis
DCI Frank Merlin makes his compelling debut.
January 1940. A brilliant scientist is killed by a hit and run driver and the body of a woman employee of the American Embassy is washed up in the Thames. DCI Frank Merlin and his team must investigate.
The American Ambassador, Joseph Kennedy, is a well-known supporter of appeasement and, in common with many influential Britons, favours the pursuit of a negotiated peace settlement with Hitler. Against a background of diplomatic intrigue and duplicity, Merlin’s enquiries, cause alarm at the Embassy and the Foreign Office.
The death of another embassy employee leads Merlin down into the murkier depths of London wartime life, his investigations hampered by interfering superiors fearful of his impact on Anglo-American relations at a time when America represents to many Britain’s only hope of salvation.
Paperback ISBN 978-0-9929943-8-9
Ebook ISBN 978-0-9932917-0-8
STALIN’S GOLD
DCI Frank Merlin returns in Mark Ellis’s masterly sequel to PRINCES GATE.
December 1938. Moscow. Josef Stalin has lost some gold. He is not a happy man. He asks his henchman Beria to track it down.
September 1940 London. Above the city the Battle of Britain rages and the bombs rain down. On the streets below, DCI Frank Merlin and his officers investigate the sudden disappearance of Polish RAF pilot Ziggy Kilinski while also battling an epidemic of looting unleashed by the chaos and destruction of the Blitz.
Kilinski’s fellow pilots, a disgraced Cambridge don, Stalin’s spies in London, members of the Polish government in exile and a ruthless Russian gangster are amongst those caught up in Merlin’s enquiries. Sweeping from Stalin’s Russia to Civil War Spain, from Aztec Mexico to pre-war Poland, and from Hitler’s Berlin to Churchill’s London a compelling story of treasure, grand larceny, treachery, torture and murder unfolds.
Paperback ISBN 978-0-9929943-9-6
Ebook ISBN 978-0-9932917-1-5
Copyright
First published in hardback and paperback in the UK in 2017
by London Wall Publishing Ltd (LWP)
24 Chiswell Street, London EC1Y 4YX
Digital edition converted and distributed in 2017 by FaberFactory
All characters and events in this publication, other than those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious and any resemblance to any real person, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a database or retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.
Copyright © Mark Ellis 2017
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
EB ISBN 978-0-9955667-2-9
