Listen to a clip from Mightier Than the Sword by Jeffrey Archer

When the bomb goes off, how many passengers on the Buckingham lose their lives? You will only find out if you read the opening chapter of Mightier Than the Sword by Jeffrey Archer.

When Harry visits his publisher in New York, he's told that he's been elected the new president of English PEN, and immediately launches a campaign for the release of a fellow author, Anatoly Babakov, who's imprisoned in a Russian gulag in Siberia. Babakov's crime? Writing a book called Uncle Joe, an insight into what it was like to work as the interpreter for Josef Stalin. So determined is Harry to see Babakov released and the book published, that he puts his own life in danger.

Emma Clifton, now the chairman of Barrington Shipping, is facing the repercussions of the IRA attack on the Buckingham. Some board members feel she should resign, but Sebastian Clifton, newly elected to the board, is determined that she'll remain Chairman.

Sir Giles Barrington is now a minister of the Crown, and looks set for even higher office, until an official trip to Berlin does not end as a diplomatic success. Once again, Giles's political career is thrown off balance by none other than his old adversary, Major Alex Fisher, who, for the second time, is selected to stand against him at the general election. But who wins this time?

Sebastian asks his American girlfriend to marry him and she happily accepts, only to break off the engagement when she discovers what Seb has been up to behind her back.

Mightier Than the Sword ends with two courtroom trials. One, a libel case held at the High Court in London; a fierce battle between Emma Clifton and Lady Virginia Fenwick, and no-one can believe how far Virginia will go to make sure she wins. The second, a show trial, takes place in Russia after Harry is arrested as a spy.