Terror Is My Trade

By Stephen Marlowe

Crossing the Atlantic on NATO's behalf, Drum tangles with mobsters, blackmail, and murder.

As the H.M.S. Queen Victoria pulls out of New York Harbor, danger encircles Chester Drum. He's sailing for Europe on the largest luxury liner ever built, but it's not big enough to hold the secrets on board -- or the men who keep them. And by the time the liner reaches Southampton, she will be missing a few passengers. Drum can only hope he isn't among those who don't make it to shore.

Hired by a NATO functionary as a bodyguard, the private investigator quickly learns his real assignment: protecting his client from a Chicago mobster with dreams of blackmail. Keeping the mafia at bay is tricky enough, but when a State Department colleague ends up in the line of fire, Drum sets his mind on getting even. After all, there is no better spot for vengeance than the icy waters of the open sea.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Head of Zeus
• Release date: Jun 1, 2014
• ISBN: 9781784087104

Stephen Marlowe

Stephen Marlowe (1928–2008) was the author of more than fifty novels, including nearly two dozen featuring globe-trotting private eye Chester Drum. Born Milton Lesser, Marlowe was raised in Brooklyn and attended the College of William and Mary. After several years writing science fiction under his given name, he legally adopted his pen name, and began focusing on Chester Drum, the Washington-based detective who first appeared in The Second Longest Night (1955). Although a private detective akin to Raymond Chandler’s characters, Drum was distinguished by his jet-setting lifestyle, which carried him to various exotic locales from Mecca to South America. These espionage-tinged stories won Marlowe acclaim, and he produced more than one a year before ending the series in 1968. After spending the 1970s writing suspense novels like The Summit (1970) and The Cawthorn Journals (1975), Marlowe turned to scholarly historical fiction. He lived much of his life abroad, in Switzerland, Spain, and France, and died in Virginia in 2008. 

Reviews for Terror Is My Trade

[davewilde-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The seventh Chester Drum novel takes Drum on a journey across the European continent as he tangles with political intrigue, blackmail, mobsters, family secrets, and is filled with action aboard an ocean liner, fist fights, and a race across Italy. This novel covers a lot of territory and Drum is a spy, a political operative, a conspirator, and a genuine good guy trying to do the right thing. There is more than one femme fatale here. The Drum series is one of the toughest and most hardboiled out there, placing Drum in a different country in each novel. This is not one of the best Drum stories as the plot becomes a bit convoluted and seems to get a little lost along the way. However, the fights with the mobsters in London, Paris, and Venice are great. The chase across the Italian countryside is not to be missed and nor is the final showdown. Overall, its definitely worth a read, particularly if you enjoy the Drum series.