Flashpoint

Wilbur Smith
(with David Churchill)

BY the spring of 1943, war has taught SOE agent Saffron Courtney that there is no escape from feelings of fear, exhaustion, extreme stress and heart-rending grief… life goes on and so does her job, wherever it may take her.

But, after a blistering mission in Washington DC saw a man shot dead and Saffron forced to flee the city without even her luggage, she knows that her swift exit to New York has come at a price that will one day cost her dearly.

From the dawn of the 17th century right through to the 20th century, we have witnessed the fortunes and misfortunes of the sprawling and ambitious Courtney family as they negotiate war, social upheaval and the dark side of history.

Their creator is the phenomenally successful South African author Wilbur Smith (below, left), a legendary figure in historical adventure fiction who died in 2021 and left behind a vast literary legacy of over 40 novels, including the Courtney, Ballantyne, and Egyptian series. Since 2015, critically acclaimed writer David Churchill (below, right) has co-authored several of the later Courtney books, helping to successfully usher Smith’s treasure trove of family sagas into a thrilling new era which fuses real history, action, wartime drama and espionage.

Flashpoint is the staggering 26th book in the Courtney series and, after following her daring deeds in Courtney’s War, Legacy of War and Crossfire, we meet up once again the feisty, fearless Saffron who grew up on a sprawling Kenyan estate under the watchful eye of her distinguished war veteran father Leon Courtney but was lured to England by her thirst for knowledge and adventure.

Recruited by the Special Operations Executive in London, Saffron has become one of their toughest, most reliable agents and in 1943, we find her in New York and trying to recover, albeit briefly, from her perilous mission in Washington. But events on the other side of the Atlantic are making her return to England inevitable. The War Office need someone to extract an ‘asset’ – Jewish scientist Caleb Ezra, a university academic with knowledge that is vital to the war effort – from his hideaway on the besieged Greek island of Leros.

Ezra was sprung from his home in Thessaloniki by a Greek Communist resistance group after they received inside information that both the man and his work were due to be seized by the occupying Nazis. He is now in hiding until he can be rescued by agents but hanging over Saffron is that unsettled debt in New York, and when deals have been done with the Mob, they won’t wait…

Fast forward three years to Kenya in 1946 where Saffron is settled back in her beloved homeland, and reunited with her German lover-now-husband Gerhard von Meerbach, a former Luftwaffe pilot who fought undercover to defeat the Nazis.

With the war now over, Saffron thinks that she might finally have found the peace she craves but when she is visited by an English operative who blackmails her with accusations that Gerhard was involved in Nazi atrocities, Saffron has no choice but to return to the USA at his bidding. With not only her own life, but also that of her family, at stake, Saffron must track down Ezra once more… before it’s too late.

Flashpoint, a suspense-packed, fast-moving tale of cat-and-mouse espionage, menace, conspiracy, and a race-against-time mission for the truth, is a thrilling journey as we travel alongside the latest, unforgettable member of the star-studded Courtneys, a family which has witnessed the unfolding of tumultuous history through many centuries.

As the resourceful and resilient Saffron once more risks life and limb in a role that requires her to get as close as possible ‘to men any sane woman would go out of her way to avoid,’ the tension ratchets up to breaking point and events dating back to Saffron’s wartime assignment in America threaten to overturn her new-found calm.

Setting the latest Courtney saga amidst of one of the most brutal wars in history was always going to be an electrifying chapter… and this new white-knuckle ride for long-suffering Saffron certainly delivers all the daring, danger and dazzle we have come to expect from this top class series!
(Zaffre, hardback, £22)