Glenn Meade

Glenn Meade, the Dublin-born writer who once worked for both The Irish Times and the Irish Independent, and still lives in Ireland, dividing his time between writing and training pilots, follows up his bestselling Brandenburg and Snow Wolf with The Sands of Sakkara. Again he works on two levels of timescale, opening the book in the present when the body of an old man is washed up on the banks of the Nile, then returning in flashback to September, 1939, to begin the main storyline.

The body may or may not be the remains of Major Johann Halder, one of German Intelligence's most brilliant agents who, during the second World War, was entrusted with the audacious mission of killing President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill, while they were in Cairo to plan the Allied invasion of Europe.

Weaver arrives to view the body, then the real story kicks off as memories crowd in around him. As usual with Meade, the research is stunning, the exotic locales immaculately described, and the action scenes explosively detailed. This is a big, gung-ho thriller that sets out to entertain and it achieves this purpose to no little effect. For escapist fare, The Sands of Sakkara is force 10 out of 10.

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