When all sorts of accusations, denials, revelations, disclosures, and leaks are swarming and spilling around the security agencies of the United Kingdom and the USA, it is worse when the Snowden effect erupts.

A bruised and slightly disillusioned Commander Elaine Black, training officer and senior security advisor at GCHQ Bude Listening Facility, is plunged into a bewildering and dangerous battle to make sense of and counter a desperate threat to British Security.

Headless bodies, fire bombings, threats of chemical warfare unloosed on a small West Country town, apparently straightforward murders and the killing of a policeman make Elaine Black thankful for the involvement of a pair of incorruptible and driven police detectives and the experience and expertise that they bring to the party.

However, as the stakes get higher and higher, Elaine is further gratified to have two old fighting companions on side. The question is, can the team confound the multinational conspiracy that stretches to the highest echelons of British and American financial and political establishments?