Art restorer and spy Gabriel Allon is sent to Vienna to discover the truth behind a bombing which killed an old friend - a Nazi hunter. While there he encounters something that turns his whole life upside down. Each fact he uncovers only leads to more questions until finally a picture emerges which is more terrible than he could have ever imagined - a portrait of evil stretching across 60 years ..

Focussing on the blind passion of an obsessive dream, this work presents the story of a quest, of a man's search for his missing daughter - and to prove his daughter's innocence from involvement in her mother's murder. And he is no ordinary man - for he is famous as a world-class yachtsman.

His father in prison for fraud, his ex-wife bleeding him dry and his spine shattered by a bullet, Falklands war hero Nick Sandman, VC, has no money and no prospects. Only his boat - Sycorax - and his dream of sailing her away from his troubles is keeping him alive. But Sycorax is as crippled as Nick.