Today is finally the official publication day for Burke in the Peninsula’. It’s been a long time coming, and I hope you all enjoy it now it’s here.

It’s an inauspicious time to be launching a new novel. It’s not just difficult to whip up excitement while everybody is so worried and insecure. (You’d think people would be buying more books, but they seemed to be turning to Netflix rather than Kindle.) It’s also a strange feeling for an author. I’d normally do something to mark the arrival of a new book, if only a few friends round for drinks at home. That is obviously not going to happen.

The New Normal, though, should be somewhere where books – whether downloaded directly to a Kindle or, increasingly, ordered online – can continue to flourish, unlike theatres, coffee shops and railway companies. So I’m grateful for small mercies and keeping my fingers crossed that you will all be rushing to your computers to buy the latest James Burke adventure.

What will you be getting?

So far, I’ve avoided the Peninsular War, but this book goes back to 1809. Fresh from his adventures in South America (Burke in the Land of Silver) James Burke is dispatched to join Wellesley’s army in the peninsula. To his disgust, he is not to be fighting as a regular soldier, but is again spying – this time travelling ahead of the army to try to build links with the Spanish guerrilla forces. But the conflict is a dirty war and Burke learns the hard way that not all the guerrillas are everything they might appear to be. It’s not long before he’s fighting for his life, but which of the Spaniards can he trust?

William Brown is with him, of course, but when the pair have to split up, Burke takes the war to the enemy behind French lines while Brown ends up fighting alongside the infantry at the bloody battle of Talavera.

So you get James Bond heroics and military historical fiction. There’s a girl, too – somebody from Burke’s past who I’m delighted to meet again. That’s adventure and romance and history: all for £3.99 on Kindle and £6.99 in paperback.

One of the reasons why you have had to wait so long for this book has been problems with the American rights. Now these are sorted out, you can buy through Amazon in America just as easily as in the UK. I hope some of the many people who read this blog from the USA will be supporting it by buying the book.

I had fun writing this. I hope you have fun reading it.

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