Disclaimer

Lured by a double agent working for the United States, ten Russian spies, including a professor at the University of Minnesota, his wife, and a classic “sleeper” spy in New York City, were sent by Moscow to penetrate America’s secrets. Two FBI agents were killed, and secret formulas were passed to the Russians in a dangerous ploy that could have spurred Moscow to create the world’s most powerful nerve gas.

• more than 4,500 pages of classified documents, including U.S. nerve gas formulas, were passed to the Soviet Union in exchange for hundreds of thousands of dollars

• an “Armageddon code,” a telephone call to a number in New York City, was to alert the sleeper spy to an impending nuclear attack—a warning he would transmit to the Soviets by radio signal from atop a rock in Central Park

• two FBI agents were killed when their plane crashed during surveillance of one of the Soviet spies as he headed for the Canadian border

• secret “drops” for microdots were set up by Moscow from New York to Florida to Washington

More than a cloak-and-dagger tale, is the spellbinding story of one ordinary man, Sergeant Joe Cassidy, not trained as a spy, who suddenly found himself the FBI’s secret weapon in a dangerous clandestine war.

The reader should grasp clearly the date at which this book was written. It was done in 1907: it appeared in various magazines as a serial in 1908 and it was published in the Fall of that year. At that time the aeroplane was, for most people, merely a rumour and the "Sausage" held the air. The contemporary reader has all the advantage of ten years' experience since this story was imagined. He can correct his author at a dozen points and estimate the value of these warnings by the standard of a decade of realities. The book is weak on anti-aircraft guns, for example, and still more negligent of submarines. Much, no doubt, will strike the reader as quaint and limited but upon much the writer may not unreasonably plume himself. The interpretation of the German spirit must have read as a caricature in 1908. Was it a caricature? Prince Karl seemed a fantasy then. Reality has since copied Prince Carl with an astonishing faithfulness. Is it too much to hope that some democratic "Bert" may not ultimately get even with his Highness? Our author tells us in this book, as he has told us in others, more especially in The World Set Free, and as he has been telling us this year in his War and the Future, that if mankind goes on with war, the smash-up of civilization is inevitable. It is chaos or the United States of the World for mankind. There is no other choice. Ten years have but added an enormous conviction to the message of this book. It remains essentially right, a pamphlet story—in support of the League to Enforce Peace. K.

Joss has escaped the Colonies but her troubles have only just begun. She’s wounded, exposed and vulnerable but worst of all, she needs help. And there’s only one place she can go to get it. Only one place she can stand to be.

With Ryan.

Together they’ll have to delve into the seedy underworld of post-apocalyptic Seattle. A world of gambling, fighting, secrets and lies. A world governed by The Hive.

But the deeper they sink, the more they’ll find that The Hive isn’t everything it seems. That even the mighty have someone to fear. Is the enemy of their enemy their friend? Or is there another threat, one greater than the Risen or the Colonies, looming in the distance?

It wasn't Archie's fault really. Its true he went to America and fell in love with Lucille, the daughter of a millionaire hotel proprietor and if he did marry her—well, what else was there to do?

From his point of view, the whole thing was a thoroughly good egg; but Mr. Brewster, his father-in-law, thought differently, Archie had neither money nor occupation, which was distasteful in the eyes of the industrious Mr. Brewster; but the real bar was the fact that he had once adversely criticised one of his hotels.

Archie does his best to heal the breach; but, being something of an ass, genus priceless, he finds it almost beyond his powers to placate "the man-eating fish" whom Providence has given him as a father-in-law

Jill had money, Jill was engaged to be married to Sir Derek Underhill. Suddenly Jill becomes penniless, and she is no longer engaged. With a smile, in which there is just a tinge of recklessness, she refuses to be beaten and turns to face the world. Instead she went to New York and became a member of the chorus of "The Rose of America," and Mr. Wodehouse is enabled to lift the curtain of the musical comedy world.

There is laughter and drama in , and the action never flags from the moment that Freddie Rooke confesses that he has had a hectic night, down to the point where Wally says briefly "Let 'em," which is page 313.

Now the people know that the dragon minions of Takhisis, Queen of Dragons, have returned. The people of all nations prepare to fight to save their homes, their lives, and their freedom. But the races have long been divided by hatred and prejudice. Elven warriors and human knights fight among themselves. It seems the battle has been lost before it begins.

The companions are separated, torn apart by war. A full season will pass before they meet again—if they meet again. As the darkness deepens, a disgraced knight, a pampered elfmaiden, and a rattle-brained kender stand alone in the pale winter sunlight.

Not much in the way of heroes.