Two veterans of World War I fight for love and honor in a Caribbean country torn apart by rebellion Lt. Robert McAllister of the US Marines first encounters Paul Blanchard on a parade ground in Belgium in 1918. Awarded the Croix de Guerre and the Victoria Cross for his service at Ypres and Passchendaele, the British sergeant coughs blood onto his commanding officer's boots and curses the war. A year later, McAllister commands a platoon of marines in occupied Haiti, where a peasant uprising threatens to topple the American-backed regime. Led by a charismatic revolutionary named Martel, the rebels, known as the Cacos, have a secret weapon: a white Caco who fights with a terrifying combination of cunning and courage. When the mysterious mercenary abducts a marine colonel's daughter, McAllister rushes to save her. It is more than his duty—he and Caroline Barbour are in love. The deeper he journeys into enemy territory, however, the more...

Three civilians fight to survive China's communist revolution in the suspenseful debut novel from the acclaimed author of The Chinese Bandit China, 1948. As the Red Army marches south from Manchuria, the rest of the country awaits the defeat of the Nationalist regime with a paralyzing mixture of hope and fear. Andrew Girard, an American professor at a Chinese university, believes that the future holds the promise of a fairer, more peaceful China. His mistress, Li-ling, shares his optimism but is caught between the love she feels for her former teacher and the loyalty she owes her father, a powerful and corrupt profiteer. Wen-li, Girard's pragmatic young servant, knows that in the violent chaos of revolution, the brave and idealistic often pay the highest price. Told from the shifting points of view of its three main characters, The Season of the Stranger masterfully evokes the tense atmosphere of a nation on the cusp of...

An American soldier of fortune pursues a Japanese war criminal through the streets and alleyways of war-torn Peking in this edge-of-your-seat thrill ride from the author of The Chinese Bandit Peking, 1948. In the midst of a brutal winter, the Communists tighten their stranglehold on the ancient capital, preparing to strike. Peasants starve, students riot, police crack down, and an entire city shivers on the edge of revolt. A decade ago, Maj. Jack Burnham was an American civilian living in China when the Japanese invaded. Now, he has returned on a mission to capture a notorious war criminal before Peking falls to the Red Army. Kanamori Shoichi raped, murdered, and pillaged his way through China during World War II—he also broke Burnham's nose. If caught, Kanamori will be brought before a tribunal and made to pay for his crimes, large and small. But finding one man in a devastated city of millions is no simple task. Luckily, Burnham...

Based on real events, this gripping tale of military injustice ranks alongside The Red Badge of Courage as one of the most original and timeless Civil War novels ever published On a fine September morning in 1864, Lt. Marius Catto leads a platoon of Union army soldiers across a Kentucky meadow. A figure rises in the distance and takes aim. Catto dives to the ground, but it's too late—the lead ball lodged in his shoulder will be his final souvenir of the war. The shooter, a barefoot teenager named Thomas Martin, claims to be a Confederate soldier, but he wears no uniform and his rifle is older than most of Catto's men. Taken prisoner and brought back to the garrison in Cincinnati, Martin is court-martialed as a guerrilla, found guilty, and sentenced to death by firing squad. From the bare facts of a long-forgotten incident in the final days of the Civil War, author Stephen Becker has crafted an indelible portrait of the...

From the killing fields of World War II to a Chinese POW camp during the Korean War, this mesmerizing novel is a tribute to the legacy of the Greatest Generation Separated from his fellow American soldiers, Benny Beer walks alone on a frozen plain in Germany during World War II. Lost and afraid, he seeks shelter in an abandoned tavern and encounters a victim of the Holocaust. Benny tries to save the suffering man's life, but never knows if he succeeds—he wakes up in a hospital bed, wounded and missing his dog tags, with no memory of how he got there. Sent back to Brooklyn with a limp and a Purple Heart, Benny falls in love, gets married, and becomes a doctor—not necessarily in that order—but his life is just beginning when he is called to serve his country once more. In Korea, he is captured and sent to a Chinese prison camp, where for two and a half long years he practices the fine art of self-preservation and fights the cruelty and...

An ex-marine on the run for his life brawls his way across post–World War II China in this rip-roaring adventure storyThat summer they hanged a fat man at the Western gate as a warning and example to all. Kao was a traitor, a thief, a pimp, a black marketeer—and Jake Dodds's partner. So what if he traded stolen military supplies with the Japanese, Jake wants to know. He never cheated me. But 1947 Peking is a savage, cutthroat city, and the United States Marine Corps sergeant is too busy saving his own skin to put up a fight over Kao's fate. Jake served his country with honor in World War II, but when he knocks an American brigadier general through a barroom window, no amount of battlefield scars or combat medals will save him from prison. So he sets out across the Gobi Desert with a caravan of Kao's illicit goods—and plunges into a world of violence and treachery that will take every ounce of his...

An American engineer journeys to the tropics to build a bridge and reclaim his manhood in this brilliant tragicomedy written during the height of the Cold War Fleeing two bad marriages and the sneaking suspicion that failure is his destiny, Bernard Morrison boards a flight bound for a freshly liberated country in desperate need of infrastructure. When the plane finally touches down, the pilot has happy news: The airport and the capital are not under attack. So far, so good, thinks Morrison as he heads for the jungle. The bridge he has been sent to build may be in the middle of nowhere, but the work requires discipline and fortitude—qualities long missing from Morrison's routine—and his interactions with the native laborers and their bosses are refreshingly out of the ordinary. When he discovers a primitive tribe living near the construction site, Morrison revels in their freedom and lack of inhibition. He vows to protect the innocent...

A riveting tale of love and death in a small New Mexico town that ranks alongside Anatomy of a Murder and To Kill A Mockingbird as one of the twentieth century's most captivating courtroom dramas On a sultry day in the spring of 1923, Louise Talbot spends the last afternoon of her life lounging in the shade of a sycamore tree in her front yard. Beautiful and vivacious, Louise is the talk of Soledad City—every man lusts after her; every woman wants to know her secrets. She is found strangled to death that evening, and when the investigation uncovers her affair with another man, the citizens of the frontier town draw the obvious conclusion: Bryan Talbot murdered his wife in a fit of jealousy and rage. Presiding over the trial is twenty-nine-year-old Ben Lewis. Appointed to the bench as a tribute to the memory of his late father, he fears he is too inexperienced to sentence another man to death. All the evidence points to Talbot,...

A corporate executive stands accused of a terrible crime in this searing legal drama from the bestselling author of A Covenant with Death The managing director of a popular West Coast television network, Joseph Harrison has everything a man could want: a successful career, a loving family, the promise of a bright and prosperous future. His life is one happy circumstance after another—until the fateful evening he gets behind the wheel after drinking three martinis and hits a pedestrian. Arraigned on charges of manslaughter, Harrison knows that his perfect world is lost forever. But no one seems to think he should pay for his crime. Not the chairman of the network's board of directors, who immediately hires a slick Hollywood attorney to defend Harrison. Not the eyewitnesses to the accident, whose testimonies suddenly change when they step inside the courtroom. Not even the judge, who is pressured by the powerful interests that stand behind...