The Crucible - Part 1

Southern Cameroon, West Africa 1936 A virus mutated and crossed the barrier from primate to human. In less than a century it had claimed the lives of twenty-five million people. Africa, a land of natural beauty and riches, ripe for plunder, full of dark menace. In a near future scenario of viral pandemic, global religious conflict, climate change and mass migration, America and the Middle East are locked in a religious fundamentalist race to Armageddon, while the old nations of Europe flex their imperial muscles. Will mankind rediscover the Garden of Eden or ignite the crucible of the apocalypse? The Europeans are using stealth and Thomas is the most deadly of mercenaries. Any conscience he had died with his wife and children under a blood-soaked African sun. He works for an agency with a taste for righting wrongs on a grand scale - an organisation with deep pockets, altruistic motives and a pragmatic approach to the dispensation of justice. Greg is a failed philanderer and small-time inventor, struggling to earn a crust for his family. When the enigmatic Thomas steals his identity, Greg is lured into a web of global corruption, conspiracy and murder. But are these unlikely friends really on the side of good or evil?

Ruby Barnes is the author of Peril, The Baptist, Koobi Fora, Getting Out of Dodge and The New Author.