Richard S Hartmetz

Murry Peterson: Echelon Richard S Hartmetz

Publisher Marketing: General Zarkov is dead, but only Muriel Peterson and Officer Laskey know about it. While Laskey is on medical leave, MacGuffin approaches Murry personally, attempting to incorporate her into his plans for world domination by ODESSA. Murry discovers that one of her old friends has allied herself with a conspiracy theorist and has uncovered information about the A. S. E. group's connection to the CIA. She also discovers information on a system of computers and satellites known as Echelon, which allows the government to spy on every telephone call, or transmission made in the entire world. To keep her off track, she and the rest of the team are sent to Nicaragua and Afghanistan to train groups of young agents to fight against the Communist threat. Murry is appalled at the conditions and abuses that she observes and threatens to reveal what she has learned, putting her in harm's way. Laskey takes Zarkov's place at the head of his sleeper organization and begins to import opium and heroin into Cuba and the U. S. while Murry attempts to track him down and eliminate the threat forever. Events continue to spiral out of control and a final battle between the forces of good and evil breaks out, costing the lives of more members of the team. When the smoke clears, Murry realizes that the cost may have been far too great. Contributor Bio:  Hartmetz, Richard S Alexandre Dumas was born Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie on July 24, 1802 in Villers-Cotterets, Aisne, France, the youngest of two children. His father was the son of a French nobleman and a Black slave and took the name Dumas from his mother, fighting as a general under Napoleon himself. He died of cancer when Alexandre was four, leaving the family very poor. Working at the Palais Royal, under the Duke of Orleans, Dumas began writing articles and plays under the name Dumas, as his father had done. His plays became popular, and he took to writing full time. In 1830, however, he became embroiled in the French Revolution, which placed the Duke of Orleans on the throne. After peace was restored, Dumas began writing novels which were translated into many other languages, earning him a great deal of money, which he spent as fast as he made. Living the high-life and having as many as forty mistresses, he wrote more than 100,000 pages in his lifetime. When Napoleon became president, ousting the Duke of Orleans, Dumas fled to Belgium, then to Russia and Italy. In 1840, he married Ida Ferrier and had at least seven illegitimate children. He died on December 5, 1870, in Seine-Maritime, France, at the age of 68. In 2002, his ashes were reinterred in the Pantheon de Paris, a great honor.