Longitude Lost

A World War II Warship Discovered in the Karakoram Mountains!

From the New York Times bestselling author of STORMING INTREPID, Payne Harrison straps you in for a thriller unlike anything before!

Army Major Ross Jessup is at the tail end of his tour as commander of the Delta Force Sabre-Black Squadron. But then he receives orders recalling him to the Pentagon from Afghanistan. Perplexed by the summons, he reports to the lower basement of the building’s D-Ring; and there he meets a ‘retired’ three-star general who works directly for the President. The general offers Jessup the post as commander of an elite team. A team that deploys over the globe on singular missions – at the behest of the President. Missions that are astonishing, bizarre, unexplainable . . . and frightening. 

Jessup accepts and takes command of the small but extraordinary unit – a group known only as ‘The Jedburghs.’ Shortly thereafter, they are deployed to the roof of the world in the Karakoram Mountains – along the disputed zone between India and Pakistan. There they confront a situation that is beyond belief and reason. For at 18,000 feet, entrapped in ice on the ledge of a snowy massif, lies a World War Two warship.

Payne Harrison is a New York Times bestselling author.   His novels include Storming Intrepid, Thunder of Erebus, Black Cipher, Forbidden Summit and EUROSTORM.  His work has been called “expertly written and well researched” by the New York Times, and “masterpiece” by Publisher’s Weekly.  Thunder of Erebus was a main selection of the Military Book Club, and his works have been translated into nine languages.

STORMING INTREPID

New York Times Bestseller

“Well researched and expertly written.”

— New York Times

“Run, do not walk, to the bookstore.”

— UPI

“ZOWIE! Storming Intrepid cost me a night’s sleep”

— Stephen Coonts, Author of Final Flight

Hijack, Betrayal, Murder—The Ultimate Suspense

In this classic Cold War novel, Payne Harrison straps you in for a techno-thriller ride as the superpowers square off to control the strategic high ground of space.

Crippled and silent, the Intrepid orbits the earth.  On board is a military payload so secret that only the most senior defense and intelligence officials know of its existence.  But as Space Command mounts a mission to rescue a crew they fear is dead, a spy satellite eavesdrops on an astounding transmission between the shuttle and a ground station deep in the heart of the Soviet Union.

An SR-71 Blackbird spyplane is scrambled to brave the full fury of the Soviet air defense forces, and confirms a horrific suspicion.  The shuttle and its irreplaceable payload are under Russian control!

“In STORMING INTREPID by Payne Harrison we have a standard Big Book, with one difference. Unlike most of its kind, it is not pretentious. Indeed, it is expertly written and well researched. Otherwise, it follows the down-to-the-wire formula in which catastrophe is prevented at the last second.

The time is the immediate future. A new leader has replaced Mikhail Gorbachev in the Soviet Union. The new President of the United States is an Italian-American businessman who formerly headed a major automobile company. ‘’Storming Intrepid’’ opens in the usual manner, with a prelude taking us on a fast trip around the defense establishments of the two superpowers and even into outer space. Then we get down to business.

An American space shuttle is launched, carrying a highly secret and valuable weapon. The Russians manage to get one of their men on the shuttle as chief pilot. His mission is to murder the crew and land the shuttle in Soviet territory. What develops is a race between the United States and the Soviet Union to get to the shuttle. The United States simply cannot let the secret weapon get into Soviet hands, even if it means war.

The mastermind behind the hijacking is the head of the K.G.B., an amoral, brilliant thinker who was a grandmaster of chess. Against him are the best brains of the American think tanks and some crack pilots and spacemen. It is an exciting plot that Mr. Harrison has devised. At the end he provides a surprise that will catch the most astute reader off guard. Mr. Harrison is as wily an operator as his Russian genius.”

— New York Times Review

Thunder of Erebus

Main Selection, Military Book Club

“Thunder of Erebus succeeds above all as an action novel. Harrison’s depiction of clandestine operations under Antarctic conditions and his narrations of the U.S. air attack on the Tbilisi and the Russian undersea riposte are masterpieces of combat fiction. No fan of the genre can afford to overlook this bombshell.”

— Publisher's Weekly

The Fire and Ice of Techno-War Explodes in the Last Place on Earth!

Antarctica – blazingly cold and remote -- where a joint U.S.-Russian scientific team makes an astounding discovery deep below the Ross Ice Shelf in the shadow of the Mount Erebus volcano.

At stake is nothing less than a raw material for a new technology that will give the victorious superpower the ultimate weapon to render ballistic missiles obsolete.

Failure is not an option for either side, so to secure this material the superpowers unleash their arsenals of techno-weapons -- in the air, on the ground, and at sea in the largest naval engagement since the Battle of Midway.

“In the near-future of this techno-thriller, American scientists have developed a new superweapon. The ``graser,’’ or ground laser, provides the destruction of a nuclear blast without the fallout. But the graser requires a rare element, and the only sizable deposit is in Antarctica. Trouble begins when a reorganized Soviet Confederation sends an elite strike force, including the supercarrier Tbilisi , to the South Pole. The U.S. seems on the verge of a low-cost, high-tech victory when Soviet cruise-missile torpedoes drastically change the balance of forces and Mount Erebus, a long-dormant Antarctic volcano, comes to life. Harrison (Storming Intrepid) supplies a plausible motive for renewed Soviet-American conflict. His technologies are convincingly extrapolated from existing weapons systems. And Harrison effectively marshals a large cast of characters, among them Dana Harrow, the female geologist who discovers Erebus’s secret; and Marine general Myron Tharp and Navy pilot Blackjack Pershing, both interesting variations on familiar stereotypes. Yet Thunder of Erebus succeeds above all as an action novel. Harrison’s depiction of clandestine operations under Antarctic conditions and his narrations of the U.S. air attack on the Tbilisi and the Russian undersea riposte are masterpieces of combat fiction. No fan of the genre can afford to overlook this bombshell.”

— Publisher's Weekly Review

Black Cipher

“Crackling with techno-savvy, this slick spy thriller . . . will keep readers turning its pages long past midnight.”

— Publisher's Weekly

“What (Harrison) does masterfully . . . is illuminate the dark and arcane world of signals intelligence and code breaking. . . invites comparison with the novels of Tom Clancy or Frederick Forsyth.”

— Booklist

Enter the Clandestine World of Signals Intelligence

Secluded in the quiet Gloucestershire township of Cheltenham is the hyper-secret codebreaking and signals intelligence enclave of the British spy machine.  Known as Government Communications Headquarters, it is home to a small army of eavesdroppers, linguists, and codebreakers who secretly probe the airwaves for the defense of the realm.

Within this high-tech fortress is a man of great mystery, urbanity, and élan, whose powers in the field of cryptanalysis are nothing short of legendary.  His name is Faisal Shaikh, and when an unusual encrypted message crosses his desk, it is like a siren's song to his codebreaking skills.  Calling upon all of his knowledge and intuition, Faisal finally unlocks its secrets, and thereby casts himself as a man who knows too much in the eyes of a powerful, mysterious clique at the highest levels of the British government.

To find the key to the possibly unbreakable Black Cipher messages, Faisal Shaikh embarks upon a global quest -- from Japan to Australia, from Fort Meade to Belfast. His only hope is to tear away the veil that conceals a menacing, invisible government lurking within the halls of Westminster before his time -- and his luck -- run out.

“Crackling with techno-savvy, this slick spy thriller by the author of Storming Intrepid is distinguished by far-reaching geopolitical speculation, well-drawn heroes and villains and vivid descriptions of exotic locales. Working within the shadowy chambers of Britain’s supersecret Government Communication Headquarters, chief cryptanalyst Faisal Shaikh stumbles onto a ``Black Cipher,’’ a series of messages encrypted in a seemingly unbreakable code. Obsessed by the challenge, Faisal finally cracks the cryptogram only to find that he has stumbled onto a plot between the IRA and a highly placed terrorist faction within Her Majesty’s government. For his trouble, Faisal is discredited and thrown out of the service with a veiled threat that he will be killed unless he keeps silent. Putting his mathematical genius to work at the gaming tables, he parlays his winnings into a minor fortune on the stock market. When, by chance, Faisal reencounters the enigmatic Black Cipher, he embarks on a mission to overturn the conspiracy and clear his name. Despite the improbability of its hero’s magic-carpet mobility — Tokyo, Australia, Ascension Island, Ft. Meade, Ireland and Russia are among his venues — and of his plot — saving good luck, this highly entertaining thriller will keep readers turning its pages long past midnight.”

— Publisher's Weekly Review

Forbidden Summit

“Colonel, I… I… think you’d better look at this.”

In a granite fortress near Colorado Springs lies the nerve center of America's early warning system.  Known as Cheyenne Mountain, it conceals a small army of technicians who sweep the skies with their sensors, searching for any threat to national security.  Reporting for duty on a cold December night, NORAD intelligence officer Frank Hannon considers the graveyard shift inside the Mountain to be strictly routine.  This time, it isn't.  Four unidentified aircraft are sighted and tracked on a controlled descent over North America.  Hannon quickly alerts his superiors.  The official response--or lack of it--is puzzling.  Now, with forty-seven days before his retirement, Hannon launches his own investigation.  A strange and startling journey that will take him through a twisting maze of government lies to a desolate summit on a desert mesa.  There, far from public eyes, the truth is waiting . . .

EUROSTORM

“Another captivating gem. EUROSTORM has it all; Explosive, simmering action; plenty of bark and bite; treachery arriving on stage from all directions. Harrison’s impressive talent is on full display. Don’t miss this one.”

— Steve Berry, New York Times Bestselling Author of The Emperor's Tomb

“A bullet train speeding through Europe at a breakneck clip . . . EUROSTORM is ‘Die Hard’ done even harder, a must read.”

— Jon Land, Bestselling Author of Strong Justice

A Fourth Reich Rises From The Ashes!

Sealed within the vault of an impregnable security car on the Eurostar bullet train is a substance so secret and so lethal that only a handful of mandarins within Her Majesty's Government even know of its existence.

Yet when the train exits the "Chunnel" from England and heads toward Paris, Scotland Yard learns too late that an evil force has literally risen from the grave to ensnare the train and hijack the cargo that could alter the world as we know it.

As the cumbersome cross-Channel bureaucracies struggle to respond, the only hope that emerges to keep this horrific genie in the bottle is a small team of French commandos.  They take to the air in an attempt to board the Eurostar as it hurtles across the countryside at 186 m.p.h. -- with nothing less than the future of the planet in the balance!

America’s Team

A Short Story

Go Inside the Clandestine World of Signals Intelligence

In the wooded countryside of Maryland resides a massive installation that is the tympanic membrane of America’s early warning system.  This is the headquarters of the National Security Agency, a secure facility within the confines of Fort George G. Meade.  Here an army of engineers, scientists, cryptologists and analysts probe the ether with their antennae and satellites to pluck out those transmissions that represent a threat to the American Homeland.

And at the apex of this elegant central nervous system lies the Signals Operation Center – the ultimate inner sanctum where the electronic wheat is separated from the chaff, and the kernels are then placed before the President, his Cabinet, and the Pentagon. 

Into this lion’s den enters Army Major Ross Jessup, who recently joined a select team operating with a hyper-secret charter from the Oval Office.

AudioStory Read by Carl Huddleston

Carl earned a Degree in Music from SMU, playing several wind instruments and singing in various ensembles. He has sung for decades in various church choirs and professional ensembles, and has brought his bass voice to the narration of America’s Team.