Bøger af C. Michael Forsyth

While performing before Tsar Nicholas II of Russia, the world's greatest escape artist Harry Houdini becomes pitted against a formidable foe: Rasputin. A powerful mystic, Rasputin has made puppets of the Tsar and his wife Alexandra. To save the nation from ruin, a small band of patriots recruits Houdini to expose the imperial "spiritual advisor" as a charlatan. Houdini wages an epic battle of wits and wills with the charismatic fiend. The American magician's daring and ingenuity are put to the test in an adventure that takes him from the grand palaces of St. Petersburg to the frigid wastelands of Siberia.Along the way, Houdini makes allies and enemies of a host of real-life figures, including the mischievous imp Princess Anastasia, the colossal former boxer and royal bodyguard Jim Hercules, the crossdressing conspirator Prince Yusupov and the sinister Black Sisters, practitioners of the occult who scheme to use Rasputin for their own ends. Meticulous research brings these people and the Russia of 1911 to life.Rasputin is one of history's most fascinating villains, at once a barely literate Siberian peasant and a Nietzschean superman, a Christ-figure to his followers and the Antichrist to his foes, a faith healer and a debaucher of enormous sexual appetites. He has at his disposal an army of goons, femme fatales, Gypsies, hypnotized assassins and fanatical members of the mysterious Khlysty cult.However, Rasputin's greatest strength is his own extraordinary personal magnetism. Gathered around him is a circle of female devotees known as the Little Ladies. To help Houdini bring Rasputin down, the magician's feisty wife Bess infiltrates this coven. She falls under Rasputin's spell and Harry must rescue her from his clutches.As in Houdini's movie serials, he escapes from one peril after another: buried alive under six feet of snow; trapped in a burning barn by Rasputin's henchmen; chained to a rack in the medieval torture chamber of Ivan the Terrible. The pace steadily accelerates until Harry's final confrontation with his nemesis on a frozen river. Houdini did in fact perform for the Tsar and Rasputin did arrive in the capital that same year. Many real events are incorporated into this work of fiction.

The year is 1922. A respected judge inexplicably vanishes in a decrepit mansion and two of the world's most remarkable men are summoned to investigate: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, creator of Sherlock Holmes, and Harry Houdini, the world's greatest escape artist. Aided by a beautiful young psychic, the unlikely partners probe a mystery that becomes murkier and more perilous at every turn and brings them face to face with evil incarnate. To solve the riddle of The Spook House-and to survive its dangers-they must call upon all of their extraordinary mental and physical powers. The story draws upon the real-life friendship of Conan Doyle and Houdini, two vastly different men brought together by their fascination with the paranormal.