Spandau Phoenix was my first novel. I wrote the first hundred pages while I was still playing in my last band, Frankly Scarlet, as the band began to come apart on the road. I followed some of the “rules” of writing and getting published, and ignored others. When the band finally imploded, I was in Mobile Alabama at 3 a.m. on New Year’s Eve, standing at a phone booth in 28-degree weather. I was 30 years old, my wife was in school, and I had $9,000 to my name. I drove home to New Orleans, shut myself in our apartment, surrounded myself with library books and started working 18 hours a day. Literally. I gave myself one year to write and sell a novel. I did not attend writer’s conferences or pay anyone to help me (except one conference that a potential agent asked me to attend so that we could meet in person). I used my best buddy and fellow thriller fan as a sounding board, (a buddy who appears somewhat disguised in Sleep No More.) When I was finished, I had a manuscript 241,000 words long, almost three times the length of an average thriller today. I was consciously trying to write a bestseller at the time, using as my models Jack Higgins, Fredrick Forsyth, and Hans Hellmut Kirst. I owe a great deal to the agent who agreed to represent me then, Natasha Kern, of Portland, Oregon. Natasha organized an auction, and after a couple of nail-biting months, I had a 2-book deal with Dutton books worth $125,000— five times my annual income at the time.
The genesis of Spandau Phoenix was my fascination with Rudolf Hess’s fantastical solo mission to try to end WWII in 1941. Despite being born in Germany (to a US Army doctor) I did not really understand the political magnitude of Hess’s flight until I watched a 60 minutes episode about it. When I learned that Hess was the sole inmate of the enormous Spandau Prison in Berlin, and that England, France, the United States, and the Soviet Union were all paranoid about secret knowledge that Hess might posses about wartime actions, I started to become a little obsessed with the story myself. After Hess was (likely) murdered, I knew that I had to learn everything there was to know about Hess’s case. By the time I was done, I had uncovered details that taught me that every nation involved in war—even the last “good war”---commits terrible acts, and that all human beings–even our most celebrated leaders and heroes—are subject to the most base impulses toward moral compromise. I will never write another novel as complex as Spandau Phoenix. That story is so complex that during interviews, I myself have difficulty keeping the enormity of the plot straight in my head.
Today I feel a bit embarrassed about Spandau Phoenix. It is rather overwrought in its use of italics, and is the most plot-driven (and least character-driven) of all my novels. That said, it is consistently ranked by the public and particularly WWII buffs as one of the great conspiracy thrillers out there. If you read it in that light, I think you will find a lot of enjoyment, and without doubt more World War Two history than in any two other thrillers.
A long-buried Nazi secret erupts into a nerve-shattering nightmare, as fact meets fiction in this explosive international thriller.
In 1941, Rudolf Hess, Hitler's fanatical Deputy Fuhrer, shocked the world by flying on a seemingly mad peace mission to Britain. He was captured there, and after the war, spent the rest of his life behind the forbidding walls of Berlin's Spandau prison
In 1987, with that sole remaining prisoner's death, Spandau is razed, and the strangest, most mysterious chapter of World War II is closed forever...Or is it?
The answer to this question is a decisive and deadly no for Berlin police sergeant Hans Apfel. In the rubble of Spandau, Hans discovers a sheaf of tattered papers in a hollowed brick. It is the half-mad diary of Prisoner #7, known to the world as Rudolf Hess. And it holds the first shocking revelation of why Hess flew to Britain, and the terrifying dimensions of Hitler's boldest, most brilliant move at the height of his evil genius.
Thus the most vicious and momentous competition in the annals of international espionage is set in motion. In a Germany moving toward unity, in a Soviet Union falling part, and an Israel facing destruction, the most skilled players of the post-glasnost era will stop at nothing to seize the Spandau papers. Brutal violence, global intrigue, treason, and terror turn innocent bystanders into desperate combatants - in a world where nations battle for supremacy and trust is another word for suicide.
With unforgettable characters - including Sgt. Hans Apfel and his estranged father, forced to ally themselves against impossible odds; Hans' kidnapped wife, fighting to save her unborn child; and a driven Israeli agent whose country's survival depends on the contents of the Spandau diary - this riveting thriller moves relentlessly across time and around the globe. Its pulse-pounding action ranges from Germany to South Africa, from England to Israel, from a World War II conspiracy to its long-delayed but inescapable endgame - a Nazi dream that will not die. Greg Iles has written a brilliant epic novel that rips open the last great secret of World War II.
Praise for Spandau Phoenix
"Start with an irresistible plot, add a heavy dose of historical intrigue, mix in a host of shadowy characters, just a dash of terror on every other page, a pinch of suspense in each paragraph, bring it to a quick boil then let it simmer for 500 pages, and you have Spandau Phoenix, a scorching read. A fine first novel!"
- John Grisham
"Iles was woven an incredible web of intrigue and suspense, an avalanche of action from the first page to the last."
- Clive Cussler
"One of the great unsolved mysteries of World War II is the fascinating premise of this remarkable novel Spandau Phoenix is a terrific old-fashioned thriller in the great tradition of Jack Higgins and Len Deighton. Greg Iles has created an entirely plausible tale, part fact, part conjecture, and totally engrossing. The characters are fascinating, the narrative is skilled, and the dialogue rings true. An impressive first novel."
- Nelson DeMille
"Greg Iles mixes action and suspense like a master - Spandau Phoenix is a sizzling hot read."
- Stephen Coonts
"Greg Iles wins the title of 'thriller writers' thriller writer' with Spandau Phoenix."
- Richard Condon
"Ferociously entertaining. A terrifying alternate scenario to history that is both believable and surprising."
- New Orleans Times-Picayune
"Filled with action, interesting characters, and a compelling plot. A fascinating mixture of political critique and techno-thriller."
- New York Daily News