Lionel Davidson Books

A thriller, set against the background of the Six Day War, in which a shepherd - a murderer on the run - discovers a species of gazelle thought to be extinct, and breeds a herd of them. Then he is discovered by two boys - one Israeli, one Arab.

The Chelsea Murders (1978) was Lionel Davidson's seventh novel, earning him the Crime Writer's Association Gold Dagger Award and prompting the Daily Telegraph to declare, 'Lionel Davidson is one of the best and most versatile thriller writers we have.' A terrifying, grotesque figure bursts into a young art student's room.

'Beyond question the book of the year.' Spectator Chaim Weizmann was a great man, one of the founders of modern Israel. He was also a chemist of international repute. His work in the thirties led him to a cheap way of synthesising oil. But politics took over and it seemed Weizmann had died without passing on his revolutionary knowledge. In the oil-starved seventies, it falls to Igor Druyanov to reconstruct that magic formula. And the chase is on, for the news will overturn the Middle East . . . Tense, intelligent and stylish, The Sun Chemist is gripping spy thriller from a true master of the genre.

Kolymsky Heights. A Siberian permafrost hell lost in endless nights, the perfect setting for an underground Russian research station. It's a place so secret it doesn't officially exist; once there, the scientists are forbidden to leave. But one scientist is desperate to get a message to the outside world. So desperate, he sends a plea across the wildness to the West in order to summon the one man alive capable of achieving the impossible ...

In the forbidding mountains of a remote, hidden land, a goddess cries a river of emeralds, an enemy army is missing on the border, and Charles Houston is fighting for his life in an avalanche of danger. Searching for his missing brother, he comes upon an innocent people and is plunged into a bizarre religious ritual.

Casper Laing, the young, fiery and brilliant Professor of Semitic Languages, is asked to decipher an ancient parchment found in Israel. Piecing together its mysterious fragments, his translation soon reveals directions to a shrouded location. Believed to be the secret hiding place of the True Menorah, an ancient and priceless Jewish candelabrum, the Jordanians and Israelis begin a frantic race to claim the prize. Surrounded by violent and treacherous rivals, Casper is enjoined on a deadly adventure deep into the burning Negev desert. A Long Way to Shiloh (1966), Lionel Davidson's third novel, was a Book Society Choice and won the Crime Writers' Association Gold Dagger Award as well as the Crime Critics' Award for Best Thriller of the Year. Published in the USA as The Menorah Men, it was a no. 1 bestseller on both sides of the Atlantic. It further cemented his reputation as one of the pre-eminent genre writers of his generation, and was described by the Guardian as 'first-rate' and by the New York Times as 'a supple delight in which learning, wit and style are beautifully integrated.'

Young Nicholas Whistler, dissolute and disillusioned, lives a life of dull monotony in London. Caught up in a petty money-lenders dispute, he finds himself sent to Prague to discharge the debt by carrying out a simple assignment. But this business trip will soon drag him deep into the dangerous world of Cold War espionage and the battle for atomic supremacy. Trapped between the secret police and the amorous clutches of the mysterious and statuesque Vlasta, Nicholas must face the fact that now he is a spy, whether he likes or not

Een Engelse filmploeg wordt tijdens opnames op de Mount Everst vermist. Aanvankelijk luidt het bericht dat alle leden van de ploeg zijn omgekomen, totdat duidelijk wordt dat een aantal van hen nog in leven is en vastzit op Tibetaans grondgebied. Het is eind 1949 en het Chinese leger staat op het punt Tibet binnen te vallen. Charles Houston gaat op zoek naar zijn broer Hugh, die deel uitmaakte van de filmploeg. Na barre omzwervingen belandt hij op een heilige plaats: het kloostercomplex Yamdring, nagenoeg onbereikbaar gelegen in de hoogvlakten van Tibet. Daar wordt Houston 'herkend'als de reïncarnatie van Hu-Tzung, en tot zijn verbijstering wordt hij heilig verklaard. Deze nieuwe status biedt hem de kans door te dringen tot de abdis van dit klooster, een bovenmenselijk mooie heilige duivelin, in haar achttiende incarnatie. Zij beleven een stormachtige liefdesaffaire. In oktober 1950 is de Chinese annexatie van Tiber een feit en de nieuwe machthebbers laten hun begerig oog vallen op de kloosterschat, een onmetelijk fortuin aan edelstenen, persoonlijk eigendom van de abdis. Houston slaagt erin haar het klooster uit te smokkelen, maar vervolgens moeten zij zien te overleven onder haast ondraaglijk extreme omstandigheden, teneinde uit handen van hun wrede achtervolgers te blijven...