Alistair MacLean's Puppet On A Chain

Nothing or no one is as it seems in this powerful and uncompromising thriller, based on the breathtaking novel by Alistair Maclean.

When ex-British Army Officer Paul Sharman travels to Amsterdam to reconnect with his anarchic little brother Danny, their short lived reunion ends in tragedy at the airport. A young, drug addled woman advances towards Danny carrying a bomb in her backpack. As it is detonated, he is caught in the explosion, dying in Sharman’s arms.

Amsterdam detectives Maggie de Groot and Nils Rohe interview Sharman as a witness. Desperate for answers but uncertain of whom to trust, he decides to investigate the case himself - employing his own more unorthodox tactics to get the results he needs. Sharman's army training coupled with his edgy, unpredictable nature makes him a fierce and irrepressible force against any danger that presents itself to him. Walking through the streets of Amsterdam, Sharman understands its seedy underbelly only too well - he is plagued by memories of his own dark descent into drug addiction, which led him to be expelled from the army.

Through talking to a dancer in a local strip club, Sharman learns that Danny’s killer worked there. The club owner claimed that she was sent to a rehab centre to be treated for a heroin addiction. On visiting the centre Sharman finds no patients or doctors - but instead a closely guarded church, emptied but for boxes of rubber toys. What truth did Danny unearth that cost him his life? Was the girl at the airport a pawn in this deadly game and who and what are the higher influences at work? Hiding in the shadows is an evil that manipulates the weak with heroin, bending them to its nefarious will.

Sharman joins forces with Detective Maggie de Groot, to root out the man pulling the strings. This pursuit catapults them into a frenzied and torturous mission that threatens their lives at every turn. With the demons of Sharman’s past at his back - can he survive them a second time?