Bartlett

1828: Matthew Hervey of the Sixth Light Dragoons has been urgently recalled to South Africa. The stability of the Cape Colony has been threatened by Xhosa tribesmen who have been making incursions across the borders. When Hervey is told by his old friend, Sir Eyre Somervile, that the Zulu warrior king, Shaka, is about to make war on neighbouring tribes, he knows that matters are perilous indeed.

These are short stories of one of the greatest writers in the world, Anton Chekhov. For more than 100 years, his humor and philosophy have surprised readers by their depth and brightness. These stories are for Russia and Russians, as much today as they were 100 years ago.

FBI Agent Pendergast has taken Constance on a whirlwind Grand Tour. They head to Tibet, where Pendergast intensively trained in martial arts and spiritual studies. At a remote monastery, they learn that a rare and dangerous artifact the monks have been guarding for generations has been stolen. Pendergast agrees to take up the search. The trail leads him and Constance to the maiden voyage of the Queen Victoria passenger liner - and to an Atlantic crossing fraught with terror.