A woman is found dead on the island of Gozo. The cops say she fell from the Azure Window tourist spot, but her father thinks otherwise. CIA Section Chief Foster needs help to prove it was murder, so he turns to the only person he knows can get the job done: John Steel. The Hive, securely seated under the US Embassy on the island of Malta, is an operation that monitors all passage from North Africa and the Middle East into Europe and the US. A platform that requires the latest in technology and facial recognition. In seven days, that software will be updated. In two days, all hell will break loose. And the clock is ticking for an attack on American soil. Together with the beautiful Sammara Malk of Mossad, can Steel find out who killed Lucy - and stop whoever is behind the impending attack?
The author has written this novel with a sentimental feeling about the land of his ancestors, the Maltese people. A people who have shown remarkable courage and faith on many occasions in the history of the Mediterranean. The story of this book tells of their courage during the Great Siege of 1565, just as Voltaire said, No siege is better known than that of the Great Siege of Malta. The five-century-old religious fight between Christians and Muslims, known as the battle between the Cross and the Koran, drifted to the shores of Malta where the Order of St. John of Jerusalem had their headquarters. It produced many heroes and tyrants, several of these are the subject of our novel. The great Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent, unchallenged emperor of the Great Ottoman Empire, tries to impose Islam over Christian Europe. During five centuries, the Christian Crusaders were slowly expelled from the Holy Land, and now the great Sultan drives out the Order of St. John of Jerusalem from their last stronghold, the fortress in the island of Rhodes. Then the battle shifts to the brave Island of Malta where its people play an important role in helping La Valette and the Order fight the Turks. Jean De La Valette, commander of the Orders Christian navy, knight-adventurer, and defender of the faith, engages famous Muslim pirates, like Barbarossa and Dragut Reis, and harasses on the huge Turkish navy. He seeks to recover the Holy Cross taken by the Saracens. The secret of a forbidden romance in the paradise island of Rhodes haunts this warrior monk of eighty-four battlesa unique man enslaved by the Saracens and then escapes. He is later elevated to the position of grand master of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem and Rhodes. He was considered by his peers to be the man for the moment restoring the order to its former glory. One man, Jean De La Valette, the greatest of the grand masters, the rarest of human beings, defeats the Sultans Ottoman army in the Great Siege of Malta in 1565. La Valette became known as the Scourge of Africa and Asia, the Shield of Europe, fearless and indomitable, by his Holy Arms. With only seven hundred Knights and several thousand Spanish, Italian, Portuguese soldiers and fifteen thousand Maltese civilians (men, women, and children alike), he repels the great Turkish army of over forty thousand troops. A great historical novel of a great man and a valiant and victorious people, the people of Malta.
Books 4-6 in Stuart Field's 'John Steel' series of crime thrillers, now available in one volume! Blood And Steel: Detectives John Steel and Samantha McCall investigate the murder of a young woman and the disappearance of another, which becomes personal when they discover the victims' connection to one of their own. With time running out and an old enemy resurfacing, will they make it out alive? Maltese Steel: John Steel is asked by CIA Section Chief Foster to investigate the death of a woman on the island of Gozo, which the woman's father believes was murder. Steel teams up with Mossad agent Sammara Malk and dives into the Hive, an operation that monitors passage into Europe and the US. They soon discover a plot to attack American soil, with only days before the software update. Can Steel and Malk find the killer and stop the attack before it's too late? Running Steel: Detective John Steel is back in the sixth installment of Stuart Field's thrilling series. This time, Steel is on the hunt for a meticulous serial killer known as The Sentinel who is sending him postcards with clues to his next victim. With each victim tied to Steel in some way, he must race against time to catch the killer before he becomes the next target.
After a young woman is found dead in her apartment, Detective John Steel is brought in. A British cop working with the NYPD, he is a man with unique talent for finding trouble and winding up his partner, Detective Samantha McCall. Soon, another woman goes missing, and the duo must find out why. But there is a cost: the dead woman is the girlfriend of one their own, and the missing woman may have something the killer wants. As the clock ticks, the investigation runs deeper and an old enemy shows his face. Will any of them see the end of this alive?
The year is A.D. 1565 and the tiny island fortress of Malta, defended by an anachronistic crusading order called the Knights of St. John Hospitallers, is all that stands between the war machine of Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent and the very heart of Christendom. Pitifully outmatched and against impossible odds, the indomitable Grand Master Jean Parisot de La Valette nevertheless inspires his knights to "strike a blow for Christ" and sacrifice their lives to halt the invading Turks at the gates of Europe. Nicholas Prata relates the actual events of the Great Siege in riveting and graphic prose which brings the extreme heroism of the knights and the horror of combat sharply into focus.
Ing. Joseph Amato was born on the island of Malta during the years of WWII and started his sailing days while the island was a major British naval base in the Mediterranean. Having received his education at St. Augustines College and later his engineering apprenticeship at the then Royal Naval Dockyard in Malta, he went on to follow a thirty-year sea-going career in the British Mercantile Marine, starting from coastal British and European ports, Baltic and Irish seas as far as Spitzbergen, Greenland and Icelandic ports. At twenty-nine years he obtained his class I, followed with a tanker endorsement on steam and motor propulsion and moved on to deep sea shipping, engaging himself on long distance voyaging, and as requested by various shipping companies. Now Joseph has retired from pushing tankers (VLCC) around the globe and prefers to enjoy his days afloat, propelled by the wind on his ketch-rigged sailing boat.
