Product Description

This fast-paced action thriller is a multi-layered story that spans eight centuries, from medieval Germany and Prussia to present day Poland and USA centred on the legend of the Amber Knight - a beloved relic that inspired generations until the Nazis stole it. Created in 1232 during The Teutonic Crusade when the heroic knight, Helmut von Mau, dies in battle at Elblag. When the town is burned and the amber in the treasury melts and is poured into Helmut's sarcophagus, covering his body and creating the Amber Knight. Present day Gdansk. Adam Salen, director of a museum trust receives photographs of the Amber Knight which disappeared in 1945, and a demand for 15 million dollars. His assistant, Magda, believes that, given a corpse, amber and armour the knight could be recreated. Adam and Magda want the knight for the museum, but when a mafia hit man is found dead on Adam's doorstep and more corpses are discovered in woods near Hitler's Wolf's lair, it seems like there may be truth behind the myth that death awaits every unbeliever who looks upon Helmut's face.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #458488 in Books
• Published on: 2007-02-05
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 384 pages

About the Author
Katherine John is a best-selling author for Orion writing as Catrin Collier. She lives with her family in Swansea, Wales.

Customer Reviews

Gilt-edged thriller
I enjoyed Katherine John's BY ANY NAME and went out and bought another one.

This was an excellent read. An unusual premise (an ancient Teutonic knight entombed in amber), part of a Nazi looted treasure and lost during the Red Army's advance into Poland, is rediscovered and finds its way on to the blackmarket. In steps, Adam Salen, an American antiquities expert living in Gdansk, who is contacted by a gangster who is willing to sell the priceless artefact to the highest bidder.

But the amber knight becomes a rather dangerous item, and soon corpses are piling up and Adam and his assistant, Magda are in real peril.

Katherine John brings a freshness to this novel that could have taken an easy route (thank goodness no mention of the Amber Room, which seems to be a feature of many art-based thrillers). Gdansk might not seem like an obvious choice for a thriller setting, but she captures the lives of a post-Communist, free-market Poland with a lively eye, and populating it with interesting and well-formed characters. But best of all, she makes Adam Salen nicely-flawed - a woman's eye on a male hero, and that is what really sets this apart. He is not some idealised chiselled jawed hero, attractive enough, and a womaniser and gambler, but with enough faults to make him human. And the interplay with Magda, who in the hands of a male thriller writer, would have been a bit of skirt to bed by chapter five, sets up an intelligent and exciting drama that doesn't lose its way.

Great stuff, and I am going to look out for more of her novels.