Published to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic A covert operation with catastrophic global consequences collides with fate in this ingeniously inventive novel of conspiracy, subterfuge, and murder unfurling against a factual, tragic, and heart-stopping moment in history.THE TITANIC *SECRET*April 1912: Shortly after midnight on Wilhelmstrasse in Berlin, mere yards from the British Embassy, an English spy is shot after a clandestine meeting with a German government official. He utters three cryptic words to a sentry, then dies. It’s an ambush as calculated and cold-blooded as the scheme it helps set in motion. For Gunther Voss, a tyrannical German financier who has amassed a fortune in mining, it’s the biggest gamble he has ever undertaken: commit America to joining forces with Germany against Great Britain, destroy an empire, and secure for himself the invaluable South African mining concessions currently controlled by the British. It would make the formidable Voss, already a figure of both fear and admiration in America, one of the wealthiest and most powerful men in the world. Even as devious, self-seeking, and unthinkable as the plan is, with an alliance as strong as America and Germany, it’s more than possible—it’s inevitable. It has fallen on the unique talents of Alex Tremayne of Britain’s Secret Service Bureau and beautiful Maria Weston, a pioneering, fearless, and experienced American agent currently working in Britain, to stop Voss dead in his tracks. Traveling undercover as man and wife, their mission is to neutralize Voss’s plan before he reaches the States. And they’ll be tracking Voss’s every move on the eventful transatlantic journey in unparalleled luxury, occupying a first class suite on board the Titanic, on her heralded maiden voyage from Southampton to the Port of New York. But Tremayne and Weston are unprepared for the explosive plays of fate that await them, as well as their prey, over the next few nights of their doomed journey. For the ever-shifting dedication to duty and the choices between life and death will become more immediate, more intimate, more demanding, and far more treacherous than they could ever have imagined.About the AuthorJack Steel worked in a garage, a factory, a mortuary, and an operating theatre before joining the Royal Navy’s Fleet Air Arm as a pilot. He served for more than twenty years, including active service during the Falklands War. As a senior officer, he became involved in intelligence gathering and dissemination, in covert operations in places like Yemen, and on projects classified above Top Secret. After leaving the service, he ran his own company in his adopted home of Andorra for several years before becoming a professional author. He now divides his time between writing and lecturing, principally on ships of the major cruise lines, including Cunard and Crystal. Jack Steel is a pseudonym.

Jack Thomas Reid, nephew of Robert Cavendish who first appeared in A Study in Red – The Secret Journal of Jack the Ripper languishes in the secure Ravenswood Psychiatric Hospital, sentenced to confinement ‘at Her Majesty’s Pleasure’ for a series of apparent ‘Jack the Ripper’ copycat killings in the picturesque English coastal resort of Brighton. Jack’s defence at his trial, that he is a descendant of Jack the Ripper and that the crimes were conducted by an unknown ‘mystery man’ and that Jack was drugged and made to appear as the killer was regarded as so preposterous and unbelievable that his sentence was never in doubt. When one of the policemen who conducted the original investigation into the murders begins to doubt the truth of the case against Reid, Sergeant Carl Wright and Ripperologist Alice Nickels begin an investigation into his story. What they find is told through the voice of Doctor Ruth Truman, Jack’s psychiatrist at Ravenswood, and through a series of events that take place as far afield as the beautiful island of Malta and in Warsaw, Poland. Slowly but surely and with the help of Wright’s boss Inspector Mike Holland, the link between the events that shocked and terrorised Whitechapel over a century ago, and their link with the case of Jack Thomas Reid and the ‘Legacy of Jack the Ripper’ is revealed. A Study in Red – The Secret Journal of Jack the Ripper was the winner of The Preditors & Editors ‘Best Thriller Novel of 2008 Award’ and is available from Double Dragon Publishing, Amazon and all good retailers.

A Study in Red - The Secret Journal of Jack the Ripper by Brian L Porter tells the story of Robert Cavendish, a modern day psychiatrist who is bequeathed a strange set of papers which purport to be the journal of the long-dead infamous Whitechapel Murderer whose crimes gripped the hearts and minds and instilled terror on the streets of Victorian London. As he begins to read the journal, Robert becomes convinced of it’s authenticity and finds that the words of the Ripper have a strange and compelling effect on him. Unable to cast the pages aside he finds himself being drawn into the dark and sinister world of the killer until he is unable to distinguish what is fact and what is fantasy. In short, Robert Cavendish begins to feel as though he is being taken over in some way by the soul of the long-dead Ripper. What happens as he progresses through the journal will disturb and shock the reader as the close dividing line between sanity and madness is explored to the full.

The Jack the Ripper murders of 1888 continue to exert a macabre hold on the collective imagination of the masses more than a century later, and this book, the result of extensive research, sheds some light on them. Among the first serial murders, their brutality and bizarreness begged questions such as What kind of person could have performed such horrific deeds? and How could they not have been caught by the huge police effort? The book offers keen insight into Victorian London and its policing as it follows the investigations of the infamous murders. Arguing that many unresolved questions could be answered if Jack was in reality a woman, this bold account names a suspect and explains why the murders stopped.About the AuthorJohn Morris is a legal consultant specializing in immigration.

Criminal psychologist David Hemswell receives a desperate call from a worried man. William Forbes, former solicitor to serial killer Jack Reid believes himself to be threatened by the living soul of the notorious Victorian enigma, Jack the Ripper. Convinced that Reid was a descendant of the Ripper and that the evil that first entered the current era through the inheritance of the Ripper’s journal by psychiatrist Robert Cavendish, Forbes turns to Hemswell as his last hope to free himself from the demons he believes are pursuing him. Forbes travels to Skerries Rock, David Hemswell’s private island home off the bleak, barren west coast of Cape Wrath, Scotland, where Hemswell soon realises that there is much about his visitor that is disquieting and frightening. Hemswell summons help in the form of paranormal investigator Kate Goddard, and together, the pair attempt to free Forbes of whatever strange phenomenon has assaulted his mind. As their investigation gathers pace, however, they soon begin to believe that the three of them are not alone on the tiny island. Has the soul of Jack the Ripper found a way to encroach upon the present day? Is William Forbes the living embodiment of The Ripper, or is he too a victim of the curse that appears to have been handed down across time by the unfortunate Cavendish family? As time begins to run out, and the danger surrounding them grows ever stronger by the second, David Hemswell must face his own demons and is faced with the most terrible decision of his life, as the story that began with A Study in Red - The Secret Journal of Jack the Ripper and continued in Legacy of the Ripper reaches its shattering and terrifying conclusion!