The Versailles Memorandum

By Peter Saunders

A futuristic thriller.
The year is 2046. After dirty bombs go off in four European cities, and a nuclear attack incinerates Israel, the United States of Europe has reached an uneasy truce with radical Islamism. Various city enclaves across the continent have been designated as semi-autonomous Special Islamic Zones, where residents are subject to Sharia Law as well as western law.
In the East London Special Islamic Zone, Aisha Sharizi is on the run from the religious authorities after having an affair with a kuffar boy. Her family disowns her, and she faces the prospect of public humiliation through ritual punishment, but then a shadowy man called Steve offers to help them both escape.
Across the world, in Sydney, Australia, the body of a former UK cabinet minister is fished out of the harbour. The police put his death down to a boating accident, but he was one of the very few people who knew about a secret deal stitched up by the Europeans 30 years earlier - the Versailles Memorandum.
The very existence of the memorandum is top secret. But sitting in the National Records Office in London, failed historian Harry Davidson stumbles upon a passing reference to it in government papers released under the thirty year rule. When he investigates further, the reference is removed and officials deny everything. But Davidson is nothing if not dogged, and soon the security services on both sides of the Atlantic are trying to shut him up.
Readers say:
"A great read. Provocative, imaginative and pacey" (Kate Earl, Melbourne, Australia)
"Gripping. The suspense is spot on. I wasn't ready for the end when it came. Great stuff" (Richard Wiggins, Suffolk, England)
"I really loved this novel. It was funny and thought provoking, and I liked the main character - particularly that he was an anti-hero and a bit pathetic. It was a great read" (Phil Rennie, Auckland, New Zealand)
"I thought it was brilliant and enjoyed it immensely" (Jenni Stace, East Sussex, England)
"It was a great read. Stayed up last night repeatedly telling myself I'd read 'just a bit more'" (John Humphreys, Sydney, Australia)
"A well-plotted and taut political thriller with an ingenious twist at the end. The action rarely lets up. A thoroughly enjoyable read" (Alan Cawson, Brighton, UK)

• Language: English
• Publisher: Peter Saunders
• Release date: Jan 26, 2015
• ISBN: 9781311933638

Peter Saunders

Peter Saunders was born and educated in Croydon, England. He spent more than twenty years teaching sociology at the University of Sussex, where he still holds the title of Professor Emeritus. He also taught in universities in Australia, New Zealand, Germany and the United States. He built an academic reputation with major books on city life, home ownership, British politics, social inequality and meritocracy, but in 1999 he abandoned his academic career and went to live in Australia where he found work in public policy think tanks. In Australia, he continued to write on social issues such as poverty and welfare reform, but he also began commenting on current affairs in the press and on radio and television. By the time he returned to Britain in 2008, the Sydney Morning Herald hailed him as ‘the most prominent liberal intellectual’ in Australia. He is now developing a third career, as a fiction writer. The Versailles Memorandum is his first full-length novel.

Book preview