As Hitler's forces smash into Soviet territory, annihilating the
Red Army divisions in its path, a lone German scout plane is forced
down. Contained within the briefcase of its passenger is the
seemingly inconsequential painting of a hyalophoria cecropia,
otherwise known as a red moth.
Military Intelligence dismisses the picture as insignificant, but
in the state of emergency Stalin suspects a German plot. He summons
his old adversary, Inspector Pekkala - the elusive Finn who was once
Tsar Nicholas II's personal detective - to discover the real
significance of this strange wartime cargo.
As the storm gathers around them, Pekkala, together with his
assistant from the shadowy Bureau of Special Operations, soon find
themselves on the path of the most formidable art thieves in
history. Those real target is a secret and prized possession of the
Romanovs, once considered to be the eighth wonder of the world.
But as the Soviet Union crumbles in the face of the advancing
cataclysm, and the chaos of war is everywhere, Pekkala realizes that
to protect the Tsar's treasure he must break through enemy lines.
His desperate mission is to outfox the German invaders, or face the
wrath of Stalin himself.
Sam Eastland is a pen name of Paul Watkins. He lives in the US
and the UK. Eye of the Red Tsar, the first in the Inspector
Pekkala series, was followed by The Red Coffin and Siberian Red.
