Historical Mystery Spy

John Russell, an English journalist who specializes in human-interest pieces, had always been a reluctant spy. It’s a dangerous life—especially when you are tasked with being a double agent for Soviet and American intelligence, in a city as fraught with hazard as Nazi-occupied Berlin. But it’s been years, now, since Russell was finally able to extricate himself from his life of espionage—through a shady deal with a high-ranking Soviet official. Now it’s 1953, and Russell and his family live a life of relative comfort in Los Angeles.

Hollywood, 1945. Ben Collier has just arrived from war-torn Europe to find his brother has died in mysterious circumstances. Why would a man with a beautiful wife, a successful movie career, and a heroic past choose to kill himself?

One afternoon in Manhattan's Washington Square Park, Eric Mather is approached by two men, Tom and Jerry, with a business proposal: a bit of light espionage that may be considered treason. Eric's friend and colleague, physics professor Peter Bradley, is on his way back from an international conference in Athens. In his briefcase is a roll of film that must be confiscated to keep the Cold War from turning hot. Bradley won't miss this little roll of film, they say, and nobody will get hurt.

It’s London, the Swinging '60s, and by all rights, MI6 spy Joe Wilderness should be having as good a time as James Bond. But alas, his postings are more grim than glamorous. Luckily, Wilderness has a knack for doing well for himself even in the most unpromising postings - though this has gotten him into hot water in the past. A coffee-smuggling gig in divided Berlin was a steady money-maker, but things went pear-shaped when he had to smuggle a spy back to the KGB instead.

Occupied Munich, 1946: Irina, a Cossack refugee, confesses to murdering a GI, but American captain Harry Kaspar doesn't buy it. As Harry scours the devastated city for the truth, it leads him to his long-lost German brother, Max, who returned to Hitler's Germany before the war. Max has a questionable past, and he needs Harry for the cause that could redeem him: rescuing Irina's stranded clan of Cossacks who have been disowned by the Allies and are now being hunted by Soviet death squads - the cold-blooded upshot of a callous postwar policy.

Istanbul, 1683: Mehmed IV, sultan of the Ottoman Empire, is preparing to lay siege to Vienna, capital of the Holy Roman Empire, when a mysterious visitor arrives in his bedroom - naked, covered in strange tattoos - to deliver a dangerous, world-changing message. Paris, 2017: Ottoman flags have been flying over the great city for 300 years, ever since its fall - along with all of Europe - to the empire’s all-conquering army. Notre Dame has been renamed the Fatih Mosque. Public spaces are segregated by gender.

Personable, good looking, and a whiz at physics, graduate student Allan Diffenduffer "Duff" Bogan has a bright future ahead of him. But while staying at the home of an invalid widow in Florida, Duff makes a discovery that freezes his blood: a cache of uranium hidden in the locked closet of a fellow guest. The FBI is initially skeptical, but Duff knows all too well what his findings portend.

Evelyn Ainsworth is just coming to terms with the sudden death of her father when an unexpected meeting in London exposes family secrets, changing everything she thought she knew. Faced with the task of traveling to Oslo to meet with a double agent, it’s time for the new MI6 agent to show her worth. But nothing can prepare her for what awaits her in the streets of Norway. Caught between a ruthless SS agent and the Soviet NKVD, Evelyn races to stay one step ahead of an enemy who seems to know her every move.

It is the spring of 1945. And Repp, the master sniper, is about to carry out his final mission – even as Germany’s enemies overrun it, even while a tired, disorganized team of American and British agents tries everything in its power to stop him. Because for Repp, this is the job at which he cannot fail. For this time, he possesses the ultimate killing tool. And with it, he will commit the ultimate crime.

To what lengths will the British go to smuggle a secret weapon into Nazi Germany? An unmissable Second World War thriller from bestseller Alex Gerlis. Hiding in the horror of Warsaw's Jewish Ghetto with his family, scientist Roman Loszynski has a secret: a means of making aerial bombing raids frighteningly accurate. Codenamed Tatra, it could change the course of the war. With British agent Jack Miller now in Switzerland, back in Berlin undercover spy Sophia von Naundorf is determined to escape Germany come what may.

The phone rings and the offer is made, leaving you only seconds to decide. Betray your country, or watch your family drop dead before your eyes. After the Iron Curtain's collapse, Russia appears to be finished as a superpower. But KGB general Vasily Karpov is secretly working to restore Russia's status by forcing Americans into traitorous acts of espionage and sabotage, with the aid of a new secret weapon.

Juillet 1942. Jamais l'issue du conflit n'a semblé aussi incertaine. Si l'Angleterre a écarté tout risque d'invasion, la Russie de Staline plie sous les coups de boutoir des armées d'Hitler. L'Europe est sur le point de basculer.

Septembre 1938. Hitler est prêt à déclarer la guerre. Le premier ministre du Royaume-Uni, Chamberlain, fera tout pour conserver la paix. Tout se jouera dans une ville : Munich. Tandis que l'avion de Chamberlain survole la manche, Hitler quitte le sud de Berlin en train. Tous deux se dirigent vers Munich. De leur côté, deux jeunes hommes entament le même voyage : Hugh Legat, secrétaire privé de Chamberlain, et Paul Hartmann, diplomate allemand et membre de la résistance au nazisme.

From the end of the 18th century, Americans traveled west to find new homes and new lands. They brought with them the magics of plain people. It is from these roots of the American dream that award-winning writer Orson Scott Card has crafted what the Charlotte Observer called "a uniquely American fantasy." Using the lore and the folk magic of the men and women who settled a continent, and the beliefs of the tribes who were here before them, Card has created an alternate frontier America.

St. Petersburg, New Year's Eve, 1916. Marina Makarova is a young woman of privilege who aches to break free of the constraints of her genteel life, a life about to be violently upended by the vast forces of history. Swept up on these tides, Marina will join the marches for workers' rights, fall in love with a radical young poet, and betray everything she holds dear before being betrayed in turn.

In April 1945, Hitler's Reich is on the verge of extinction. Assaulted by Allied bombs and Soviet shells, ruled by Nazis with nothing to lose, Berlin has become the most dangerous place on earth. John Russell's son Paul is stationed on the Eastern Front with the German Army, awaiting the Soviets' final onslaught. In Berlin, Russell's girlfriend Effi has been living in disguise, helping fugitives to escape from Germany. With a Jewish orphan to care for, she's trying to outlast the Nazis.

Alex Kovacs can see what’s coming – he can, all of his friends can, all of Vienna can. When an opportunity presents itself, a chance to thwart the Nazi invasion of Austria, he agrees to join an espionage network that will take advantage of his regular business trips to Germany to gather secret information. But a personal tragedy soon complicates Alex’s mission and entangles him with a suspicious Gestapo captain in ways that he never anticipated.

Prince Hywel has called all the bards of Wales to him for a music festival to mark the third anniversary of his rule over Ceredigion. He has invited all the lords of Wales too, including his father, his uncle, and his neighbor to the south, King Cadell. But with the highborn also come the low: thieves, spies, and other hangers-on. And when a murderer strikes as the festival starts, Gareth and Gwen are charged with discovering his identity - before the death of a peasant shakes the throne of a king.

Paul Schumann, a German American living in New York City in 1936, is a mobster hitman known as much for his brilliant tactics as for taking only "righteous" assignments. But then Paul gets caught. And the arresting officer offers him a stark choice: prison or covert government service. Paul is asked to pose as a journalist covering the summer Olympics taking place in Berlin. He's to hunt down and kill Reinhard Ernst - the ruthless architect of Hitler's clandestine rearmament.

May 1941. At four in the morning, a rust-streaked tramp freighter streams up the Tagus River to dock at the port of Lisbon. She is the Santa Rosa; she flies the flag of neutral Spain and is in Lisbon to load cork oak, tinned sardines, and drums of cooking oil bound for the Baltic port of Malmo. Only she is not the Santa Rosa, she is the Noordendam, a Dutch freighter that sails for the Intelligence Division of the British Royal Navy....