The Secret Chamber

Conspiracies, secrets and high-octane adventure in the Congo. Another gripping thriller from the author of The Forbidden Temple.

Imagine the claustrophobic mystery of The Constant Gardener mixed with the danger of Blood Diamond. Woodhead creates a fascinating, frightening world that draws you into the very heart of darkness. Brilliant

Woodhead takes you deep into the dark and thrilling heart of modern-day Africa. The Secret Chamber is page-turning storytelling at its best - adrenalin-fuelled adventure, danger and romance. I loved it

Patrick Woodhead is a young professional climber, who also runs White Desert, a company which arranges adventure expeditions to the Antarctic. When he is not in Antarctica, he divides his time between South Africa, the birthplace of his wife, and London.

People have been disappearing in what the explorer Stanley called the black heart of Africa - the impenetrable forests of northern Congo. But when a brilliant young English doctor vanishes, alarm bells really start to ring. Intelligence chief Jack Milton sends a message to his godson Luca Matthews (The Forbidden Temple hero) in the Himalayas asking him to go to Africa and find Joshua. Reluctantly Luca obeys, but he is no longer the man he once was, traumatised by his part in the death of his best friend, his legendary climbing nerve shot to pieces. Meanwhile in Africa, mining troubleshooter and brilliant flying pilot, Beatrice (Bear) Makuru, also wants to brave the northern wilderness. Coltan is the mineral without which no mobile phone or computer would work. Explosions have been wrecking coltan mines. Bear needs to find out why. Her journey with Luca to Africa's black heart is the beginning of an utterly terrifying sequence of events, uncovering a secret so simple yet so startling that it could rock the foundations of the civilised world.

The Forbidden Temple

Now in paperback, Clive Cussler meets Dan Brown in this high altitude adventure thriller

Think Da Vinci mystery; add handsome men and butterfly-inducing courage. Brilliant

A gripping read by a man who really knows what it is like in the mountains - dangerous!

Utterly compelling ... a real adventurer's tale packed full of mystery, intrigue and plenty of derring-do. Alex Garland's The Beach injected with far Eastern mysticism and high altitude adventure

History and culture as well as high altitude action - you'll be hooked

A mixture of high-octane adventure and Eastern mysticism that results in a riveting read.If you like Indiana Jones then you'll love this - Indiana for the modern age

Patrick Woodhead is a young professional climber, who also runs White Desert, a company which arranges adventure expeditions to the Antarctic. When he is not in Antarctica, he divides his time between South Africa, the birthplace of his wife, and London. 
 
www.thecloudmaker.net

To Luca Matthews the dangers of the high mountain peaks are the air upon which he thrives. 
In the ruthless pursuit of his goals he would sacrifice anything - even another climber's life. His friends and family know and fear it. So when he sights a virgin peak in the Himalayas that exists on no map, no one is surprised when he becomes obsessed with being the first to scale it. 
 
Together with his climbing partner, Bill Taylor, they set off into a region of Tibet highly restricted by the Chinese. But a freak accident puts one of their team in mortal danger and it is left to a local Tibetan girl to lead them to Geltang, a monastery that has been hidden from the outside world since the Chinese Cultural Revolution, when most of the monasteries were pillaged and burned. When the Chinese secret police get wind of them, Luca and Bill find themselves embroiled in an age-old struggle, not for their lives but to protect the precious secret that Geltang hides, and the legacy of Tibet itself.

Patrick Woodhead

The brand new gripping thriller from the author of The Secret Chamber. 
 
Two kilometres beneath the frozen ice caps of Antarctica lies a lake, unfrozen and perfectly preserved for twenty million years. Luca Matthews has been tasked by MI6 officer Kieran Bates to lead a team of scientists to the site to discover what secrets lie trapped below. 
 
But Bates has a secret of his own, and his actions are not going unnoticed. When mining investigator ‘Bear’ Makuru cannot reach Luca, she starts to dig into Bates’ past – uncovering a plot more sinister than she could ever have imagined. 
 
Bear needs to warn Luca – and fast. But there is an even greater threat tracking Luca across the frozen landscape: a killer who has been waiting through the long, dark months for a single chance to strike. 
 
Luca has only eight days to work out who he can trust. Antarctica is shutting down for the winter and if he doesn’t get out now, he never will.

Beneath the Ice

About us

About Us (Header 4)

Best-Jane-Austen-quotes_Online-Desktop_Penguin

James-Baldwin

Marian-Keyes

haruki-murakami-320×320-1

Richard-Osman

Malorie Blackman

Lisa-Jewell

Charlie-Mackesy

Authors (Header 3)

Children&#039;s

Company

Discover

Fiction

Non-fiction

Penguin Classics

Penguin Shop (Header 5)

Useful links

Work with us

sectionTitle

isEnabled

anchor

anchorLabel

prhuk/featured-book

prhuk/praise-section

maxBooks

showViewMore

prhuk/books-section

hideAuthorAlert

formName

iterableDivision

iterableBrand

buttonText

description

heading

legalText

successHeading

successText

image

alignment

variation

prhuk/email-section

prhuk/series-section

prhuk/biography-section

prhuk/articles-section

prhuk-authors

The perfect gift? A Penguin Shop gift card

Patrick Woodhead

Books by Patrick Woodhead

Follow penguin

Follow ladybird

Follow puffin

Sign up to the Penguin newsletter