When the bomb goes off, how many passengers on the Buckingham lose their lives? You will only find out if you listen to the opening chapter of Mightier than the Sword. 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 once again stands against him at the election. But who wins this time? In London, Harry and Emma's son, Sebastian, is quickly making a name for himself at Farthing's Bank in London, and has proposed to the beautiful young American, Samantha. But the despicable Adrian Sloane, a man interested only in his own advancement and the ruin of Sebastian, will stop at nothing to remove his rival.