A DEVILISH PLOT TO ASSASSINATE THE QUEEN, A COLD WAR ENEMY HELL-BENT ON DESTROYING THE NATION, INCREDIBLE GADGETS, A RACE AGAINST TIME AROUND THE WORLD TO STOP THE ULTIMATE DOOMSDAY DEVICE...AND ELIZABETHAN ENGLAND'S GREATEST SPY!Meet Will Swyfte—adventurer, swordsman, rake, swashbuckler, wit, scholar and the greatest of Walsingham's new band of spies. His exploits against the forces of Philip of Spain have made him a national hero, lauded from Carlisle to Kent. Yet his associates can barely disguise their incredulity—what is the point of a spy whose face and name is known across Europe?But Swyfte's public image is a carefully-crafted facade to give the people of England something to believe in, and to allow them to sleep peacefully at night. It deflects attention from his real work -- and the true reason why Walsingham's spy network was established.A Cold War seethes, and England remains under a state of threat. The forces of Faerie have been preying on humanity for millennia. Responsible for our myths and legends, of gods and fairies, dragons, griffins, devils, imps and every other supernatural menace that has haunted our dreams, this power in the darkness has seen humans as playthings to be tormented, hunted or eradicated.But now England is fighting back!Magical defences have been put in place by the Queen's sorcerer Dr John Dee, who is also a senior member of Walsingham's secret service and provides many of the bizarre gadgets utilised by the spies. Finally there is a balance of power. But the Cold War is threatening to turn hot at any moment...Will now plays a constant game of deceit and death, holding back the Enemy's repeated incursions, dealing in a shadowy world of plots and counter-plots, deceptions, secrets, murder, where no one... and no thing...is quite what it seems.From Publishers WeeklyTwo-time British Fantasy Award winner Chadbourn (the Age of Misrule trilogy) offers a grim and decidedly current take on supernatural Elizabethan intrigues. Will Swyfte, England's greatest spy, is charged with stopping the faerie and their Spanish tools from acquiring the Skull, the Key and the Shield, magic items whose combination could devastate all of Britain. Scenes range from squalid London slums to King Philip's monumental El Escorial palace and the mighty confrontation with the Armada in the English Channel. Readers familiar with cold war spy novels will wryly note Swyfte's visits to Dr. John Dee for the latest in spy technology, à la James Bond and Q. Graphic presentations of tortures from the rack to waterboarding recall contemporary issues in national security, carefully contextualized with Swyfte's dilemmas of personal versus professional codes. (Nov.) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Review"He conjures up the horror of this harsh new world brilliantly, and the sheer brutality of his writing is often jaw-dropping." --SFX"His characterisation has an energy and freshness that is lacking in too much of the genre these days." -- --Starburst

This is the Ultimate Fantasy: a quest of epic reach spanning the globe under the mythologies of five great cultures - and finally crossing the barrier between life and death. Jack Churchill, archaeologist and dreamer, walks out of the mist and into Celtic Britain more than two thousand years before he was born, with no knowledge of how he got there. All Jack wants is to get home to his own time where the woman he loves waits for him. Finding his way to the timeless mystical Otherworld, the home of the gods, he plans to while away the days, the years, the millennia, until his own era rolls around again . . . but nothing is ever that simple. A great Evil waits in modern times and will do all in its power to stop Jack's return. In a universe where time and space are meaningless, its tendrils stetch back through the years . . . Through Roman times, the Elizabethan age, Victoria's reign, the Second World War to the Swinging Sixties, the Evil sets its traps to destroy Jack. Mark Chadbourn gives us a high adventure of dazzling sword fights, passionate romance and apocalyptic wars in the days leading up to Ragnarok, the End-Times: a breathtaking, surreal vision of twisting realities where nothing is quite what it seems.Review"Chadbourn has achieved significant depth and emotional engagement and that can't be a bad thing. Mark Chadbourn always plays for high stakes in his novels and this latest offering is no different." -- Sandy Auden SFX "The first book in the remix of Mark Chadbourn's work offers a more gritty take on a war between good, evil and indifference. Think the spirit of V for Vendetta mixed with Neal Stephenson's historicism and infused by the spirit of Shakespeare's Puck: a featured character certain to invigorate future books." EDGE About the AuthorMark Chadbourn was raised in the mining communities of South Derbyshire. He studied Economic History at Leeds before becoming a national newspaper journalist. He is the award-winning author of several novels, including The Age of Misrule and The Dark Age trilogies.

A devilish plot to assassinate the queen, a cold war enemy hell-bent on destroying the nation, incredible gadgets, a race against time around the world to stop the ultimate doomsday device... and Elizabethan England's greatest spy! Meet Will Swyfte—adventurer, swordsman, rake, swashbuckler, wit, scholar and the greatest of Walsingham's new band of spies. His exploits against the forces of Philip of Spain have made him a national hero, lauded from Carlisle to Kent. Yet his associates can barely disguise their incredulity—what is the point of a spy whose face and name is known across Europe? But Swyfte's public image is a carefully-crafted façade to give the people of England something to believe in, and to allow them to sleep peacefully at night. It deflects attention from his real work—and the true reason why Walsingham's spy network was established. A Cold War seethes, and England remains under a state of threat. The forces of Faerie have preyed on humanity for millennia. Responsible for our myths and legends, of gods and fairies, dragons, griffins, devils, imps and every other supernatural menace that has haunted our dreams, this power in the darkness has seen humans as playthings to be tormented, hunted or eradicated. But now England is fighting back! Magical defences have been put in place by the Queen's sorcerer Dr. John Dee, who is also a senior member of Walsingham's secret service and provides many of the bizarre gadgets utilised by the spies. Finally there is a balance of power. But the Cold War is threatening to turn hot at any moment... Will now plays a constant game of deceit and death, holding back the Enemy's repeated incursions, dealing in a shadowy world of plots and counter-plots, deceptions, secrets, murder, where no one... and no thing... is quite what it seems.

A devilish plot to assassinate the queen, a cold war enemy hell-bent on destroying the nation, incredible gadgets, a race against time around the world to stop the ultimate doomsday device... and Elizabethan England's greatest spy! Meet Will Swyfte—adventurer, swordsman, rake, swashbuckler, wit, scholar and the greatest of Walsingham's new band of spies. His exploits against the forces of Philip of Spain have made him a national hero, lauded from Carlisle to Kent. Yet his associates can barely disguise their incredulity—what is the point of a spy whose face and name is known across Europe? But Swyfte's public image is a carefully-crafted façade to give the people of England something to believe in, and to allow them to sleep peacefully at night. It deflects attention from his real work—and the true reason why Walsingham's spy network was established. A Cold War seethes, and England remains under a state of threat. The forces of Faerie have preyed on humanity for millennia. Responsible for our myths and legends, of gods and fairies, dragons, griffins, devils, imps and every other supernatural menace that has haunted our dreams, this power in the darkness has seen humans as playthings to be tormented, hunted or eradicated. But now England is fighting back! Magical defences have been put in place by the Queen's sorcerer Dr. John Dee, who is also a senior member of Walsingham's secret service and provides many of the bizarre gadgets utilised by the spies. Finally there is a balance of power. But the Cold War is threatening to turn hot at any moment... Will now plays a constant game of deceit and death, holding back the Enemy's repeated incursions, dealing in a shadowy world of plots and counter-plots, deceptions, secrets, murder, where no one... and no thing... is quite what it seems.

1593: The dreaded alchemist, black magician and spy Dr John Dee is missing...Terror sweeps through the court of Queen Elizabeth, for in Dee's possession is an obsidian mirror, a mysterious object of great power which legend says could set the world afire. And so the call goes out to celebrated swordsman, adventurer and rake Will Swyfte - find Dee and his feared looking-glass and return them to London before disaster strikes. But when Will discovers the mirror may help him solve the mystery that has haunted him for years - the fate of his lost love, Jenny - the stakes become acutely personal.With a frozen London under siege by supernatural powers, the sands of time are running out. Will is left with no choice but to pursue the alchemist to the devil-haunted lands of the New World - in the very shadow of the terrifying fortress home of England's hidden enemy, the Unseelie Court.Surrounded by an army of these unearthly fiends, with only his sword and a few brave friends at his back, the realm's greatest spy must be prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice - or see all he loves destroyed.

SUMMARY:In this new dark Age, myth and legend has become reality; nothing is quite as it seems. The plague came without warning. Nothing could stop its progress: it's first symptom is black spots at the base of the fingers; an agonising death quickly follows. But this is no ordinary disease . . . Caitlin Shepherd, a lowly GP, is allowed to cross the veil into the mystical Celtic Otherworld in search of a cure; her search takes her on a quest to the end of a land of dreams and nightmares to petition the gods. So Caitlin is humanity's last hope, but she carries a terrible burden: a consciousness shattered into five distinct personalities . . . and one of them may not be human. THE QUEEN OF SINISTER is the latest instalment in Mark Chadbourn's riveting 'Dark Age' sequence: a masterful blend of Celtic myth and Arthurian legend in a modern setting.