David Downing

"It is 1913, and those who follow the news closely can see the world is teetering on the brink of war. Jack McColl, a Scottish car salesman with an uncanny ear for languages, has always hoped to make a job for himself as a spy. As his sales calls take him from city to great city--Hong Kong to Shanghai to San Francisco to New York--he moonlights collecting intelligence for His Majesty's Navy, but British espionage is in its infancy and Jack has nothing...

Berlin, 1948. Still occupied by the four Allied powers and largely in ruins, the city has become the cockpit of a new Cold War. The legacies of the war have become entangled in the new Soviet-American conflict, creating a world of bizarre and fleeting loyalties--a paradise for spies. Meanwhile, Berlin's German inhabitants live in fear of the Soviet forces who occupy half the city. John Russell works for both Stalin's NKVD and the newly created CIA,...

Trapped in Berlin in the darkest days of 1945, British journalist John Russell, his girlfriend, and his son struggle to survive as the Third Reich collapses around them.

"Autumn 1917: As a generation of Europe's young men perish on the Eastern and Western fronts, British spy Jack McColl is assigned a sabotage mission deep in the heart of Central Asia, where German influence is strong and where he'll be in completely unfamiliar territory. Despite his uncanny ear for foreign languages, there is much he doesn't know about the cities he's to infiltrate, or the people he's to meet there. As he quickly realizes, the mission...

Caught between Soviets and Americans, John Russell can't escape his role as an accidental spy
Book 5 in the John Russell historical thriller series.
It’s 1945, and British journalist John Russell has finally reunited with his German girlfriend, Effi, in London after a dangerous flight from war-torn Berlin. But Russell realizes his new life in England isn’t going to last when he is tracked down by Soviet agent Shchepkin, who...

"In April 1938, a man calling himself Josef Hofmann arrives at a boarding house in Hamm, Germany, and lets a room from the widow who owns it. Fifty years later, Walter Gersdorff, the widow's son, who was eleven years old in the spring of 1938, discovers the carefully hidden diary the boarder had kept during his stay, even though he should never have written any of its contents down. What Walter finds is a scathing chronicle of one the most tumultuous...

Examines the historical forces that led to the development of the system of apartheid, what life was like under the system for both blacks and whites, and the efforts that caused the end of this system.

Featuring over one hundred excerpts drawn from his wide body of letters, books, and essays, this volume brings together Lewis's reflections on the power, importance, and joy of a life dedicated to writing.