List $24.95

Written by Erskine Childers - Performed by Anton Lesser - Unabridged Fiction - 4 CASSETTES - 6 hours

Publisher, Audio Partners (June 2003)

First published in 1903, The Riddle of the Sands is set during the long, suspicious years leading up to the Second World War. Two men embark on a small boat in the Baltic, where they discover a plan for the invasion of England. Erskine Childers drew on his own experience as a sailor and added rich detail, beautiful prose, and well-crafted characters to create this classic sea adventure. This novel is considered the first modern spy thriller and the brilliant forerunner of the realism of Graham Greene and John LeCarre. A Cover to Cover Unabridged Classic.

About the Author: Erskine Childers (1879-1922) was raised in Ireland and educated at Cambridge. He became famous in 1903 with the publication of his only novel, The Riddle of the Sands. He served as a clerk to the House of Commons from 1895 to 1910. He also served in the Boer War and as a naval intelligence officer in the 1914-1918 war. Although he was a Protestant, he became convinced of the need for Irish home rule, and from 1908 on he devoted himself to this cause. He became a member of the IRA and is credited with helping to negotiate the treaty with England that led to the Irish Free State. He was captured in the civil war that followed and shot as a traitor in November of 1922. His son, Erskine Hamilton Childers (1905-1974) was President of Ireland from 1973-1974.