A Game of Soldiers

Description

A world on the brink of war, a murder to alter the course of history, 'A Game of Soldiers' is a brilliant, atmospheric thriller, perfect for all readers of Fatherland. What if Serbian terrorists had not managed to kill the Archduke Ferdinand in Sarajevo? What if their uprising was fuelled and supported by the new Russian oligarchs? What, if amid all the conspirators running through the chaos of Europe, there were one honest government agent whose determined pursuit of the killer of a child prostitute changed the course of history...? In St Petersburg, beside the glittering court life of the Romanovs, the people are seething. It is not only the Bolsheviks but also the new men, the tycoons grown wealthy in the booming economy and the more vigorous aristocrats who are impatient with the idle, incompetent Romanovs. Pyotr Ryzhkov, probing the murder of a child prostitute, suddenly finds his enquiries deliberately hampered. As the investigation widens, financiers, policemen, government officers, foreign diplomats, even the Minister of Justice, seem to be involved in an ever larger circle of fraud and violence. Then a killing gives him the final clue and leads to the desperate journey to Serbia...

Stephen Miller was born in the USA and now lives in Canada. After graduating from Virginia Military Institute in 1968, he moved to Vancouver to concentrate on creative writing and theatre, starting as a stage carpenter and working his way up to becoming an actor and scriptwriter. A Game of Soldiers is his first thriller. He is presently working on a second book which will again feature Pyotr Ryzkhov, this time in the immediate aftermath of World War One.

Praise for 'A Game of Soldiers': 'A Game of Soldiers is an engrossing thriller!full of incident, character, and period detail. Once you start this book, you won't want to put it down.' Peter Robinson 'Miller's book is on a grand scale!a vivid reconstruction of the complex politics of the period.' Sunday Telegraph 'An alternative history to get your conspiracy theory brain sells working.' Ladsmag