Katherine Neville’s groundbreaking novel, The Eight, dazzled audiencesmore than twenty years ago and set the literary stage for the epicthriller. A quest for a mystical chess service that once belonged toCharlemagne, it spans two centuries and three continents, andintertwines historic and modern plots, archaeological treasure hunts,esoteric riddles, and puzzles encrypted with clues from the ancientpast. Now the electrifying global adventure continues, in Neville’slong anticipated sequel: THE FIRE

2003, Colorado: AlexandraSolarin is summoned home to her family’s ancestral Rocky Mountainhideaway for her mother’s birthday. Thirty years ago, her parents, CatVelis and Alexander Solarin, believed that they had scattered thepieces of the Montglane Service around the world, burying with them thesecrets of the power that comes with possessing it. But Alexandraarrives to find that her mother is missing and that a series ofstrategically placed clues, followed swiftly by the unexpected arrivalof a mysterious assortment of houseguests, indicates that somethingsinister is afoot

When she inadvertently discovers from her aunt, the chess grandmasterLily Rad, that the most powerful piece of Charlemagne’s service hassuddenly resurfaced and the Game has begun again, Alexandra is sweptinto a journey that takes her from Colorado to the Russian wildernessand at last into the heart of her own hometown: Washington D.C.

1822,Albania: Thirty years after the French Revolution, when the chessservice was unearthed, all of Europe hovers on the brink of the War ofGreek Independence. Ali Pasha, the most powerful ruler in theOttomanEmpire, has angered the sultan and is about to be attacked byTurkish forces. Now he sends the only person he can rely upon–his youngdaughter, Haidee–on a dangerous mission to smuggle a valuable relic outof Albania, through the mountains and over the sea, to the hands of theone man who might be able to save it.

Haidee’s journey fromAlbania to Morocco to Rome to Greece, and into the very heart of theGame, will result in revelations about the powerful chess set and itshistory that will lead at last to the spot where the service was firstcreated more than one thousand years before: Baghdad.

Blendingexquisite prose and captivating history with nonstop suspense, Nevilleagain weaves an unforgettable story of peril, action, and intrigue.