Email : james@jamesbaddock.co.uk
The Faust Conspiracy
Book Reviews
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Daily Express
“James Baddock looks to have a winner with his Second World War thriller The Faust Consiracy. It’s the story of an SS plot to assassinate a British VIP and has much in common with Jack Higgins’ bestseller The Eagle Has Landed. Only this isn’t a plot to kidnap or kill Churchill. It is – if anything – bigger than that. A plot to assassinate King George VI. Baddock followed up a local newspaper cutting about a German agent who landed here charged with a big killing – and then let his imagination go to work to describe how ruthless SS Major Karl Vogel, with help from the ever traitorous IRA and a seductive IRA colleen, winkles out the secrets of the King’s itinerary on a visit to Rochester.
The subtle twist in the novel is that the rival German Abwehr, under Admiral Canaris, is anxious to topple Hitler and then sue for a negotiated peace with Britain. This plan would obviously be jeopardized if the King were killed, so the Abwehr sends its man to England to stop Vogel. Unfortunately, MI5 is not quite sure which is the good German and which is the bad. The whole thing comes to a stunning and exceedingly violent shooting climax at Rochester railway station.
Great stuff for a holiday read, fast paced and tautly written.” -
Publishers Weekly
“Set in wartime England, this violent, deftly written thriller relates an attempt to assassinate King George VI – and the race to prevent it. Emotionless SS Major Karl Vogel is ordered to lead an expert marksman into England for the kill, but a group of anti-Hitler conspirators, hoping to make a separate peace with the Allies against Russia, sends agent Paul Keller to stop Vogel at any cost. Persuaded by information not revealed until the wrenching conclusion, Paul tries to fulfill a mission made even more daunting by the hard-earned breakthroughs of detectives and M15 agents endeavoring to unravel what seems to be a pair of deadly plots. There is so much at stake for all concerned that bystanders are obliterated with grim regularity, but the bloodshed, while graphic, is never gratuitous. Skilled writing and dialogue and well-sustained tension contribute to an entertaining read.”
