Derek Lambert: Vendetta

As the Soviet space-shuttle Dove orbits 150 miles above the earth on its maiden flight, Warsaw Pact troops crash into Poland.

The seventy-two-year-old President of America wants to be re-elected, and for that he needs to win the first stage of the war in space: he needs to capture the Soviet space shuttle. But as the President plans his coup a nuclear-armed shuttle speeds towards target America – and only defection in space can stop it.

In neutral Lisbon, British Intelligence have concocted a ruthless doublecross to lure Russia and Germany into a hellish war of attrition on the Eastern Front and so buy Britain the most precious commodity of all: time.

That plot now hinges on one man: Josef Hoffman, a humble Red cross worker. But who is Hoffman? And where do his loyalties really lie?

Moscow treated defectors from the West with kid-gloves. That is, until they had outlived their usefulness.

But the American Robert Calder was different. He had defected to Russia with information so explosive that even the iron-clad regime of the Kremlin shook with fear. It had kept him alive. Until now. For Calder is desperately keen to return to the West. So they place the ruthless and scheming Spandarian on his trail, a KGB chief with a mind as sharp as the cold steel of an ice pick. And as a back-up they unleash Tokarev, a professional assassin who kills for pleasure…

Derek Lambert was born in 1929, and served in the RAF for two and a half years, before becoming a foreign correspondent, travelling the world to exotic locations that later inspired his novels. His travels gave him first-hand knowledge of his material and his authentic tales of espionage made him a household name and bestselling author. He spent the later years of his life in Spain, where he died in 2001 at the age of 71.

Angels in the Snow

The Kites of War

For Infamous Conduct

Grand Slam

The Red House

The Yermakov Transfer

Touch the Lion’s Paw

The Great Land

The Saint Peter’s Plot

The Memory Man

I, Said the Spy

Trance

The Red Dove

The Judas Code

The Golden Express

The Man Who Was Saturday

Vendetta

Chase

Triad

The Night and the City

The Gate and the Sun

The Banya

Horrorscope

Diamond Express

The Killing House

The Sheltered Days

Don’t Quote Me But

And I Quote

Unquote

Just Like the Blitz

Spanish Lessons

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First published in Great Britain by Hamish Hamilton Ltd 1986

Copyright © Derek Lambert 1986

Design and illustration by Micaela Alcaino © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2018

Cover photographs © Shutterstock.com

Derek Lambert asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

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Source ISBN: 9780008268497

Ebook Edition © May 2018 ISBN: 9780008268497

Version: 2018-04-18