Face to the Sun
The discovery of a valuable Central American artifact sends a desperate thief racing halfway around the globe and into a world of violence, mystery, and deadly chaos
The world has not been kind to Edmond Hawkins. Having recently fled an African nation suffering under the iron rule of a brutal dictator, Hawkins finds himself in London, penniless and with no prospects. A desperate man, he is driven to thievery, but when he pilfers a bag from a strange woman, his luck begins to change. Looking inside, he finds that in addition to a large amount of cash is a pendant made of solid gold, a rare and priceless artifact that Hawkins soon learns is a national treasure from the tiny Central American nation of Malpelo. Convinced that destiny has come knocking, he sets out across the ocean only to find himself plunged into the fiery heart of violence and revolution once he arrives. Hawkins soon realizes that his actions have inadvertently sparked an inexorable chain of events that could have devastating consequences.
The last work of acclaimed and prolific British novelist Geoffrey Household, Face to the Sun is a fitting finale to a long and illustrious career. Rich in action, atmosphere, and suspense, it is another riveting adventure from a true master who stands alongside Jack London, Rudyard Kipling, Joseph Conrad, and H. Rider Haggard.
Geoffrey Household
Geoffrey Household (1900–1988) was born in England. In 1922 he earned a bachelor of arts degree in English literature from the University of Oxford. After graduation, he worked at a bank in Romania before moving to Spain in 1926 and selling bananas as a marketing manager for the United Fruit Company.
In 1929 Household moved to the United States, where he wrote children’s encyclopedia content and children’s radio plays for CBS. From 1933 to 1939, he traveled internationally as a printer’s-ink sales rep. During World War II, he served as an intelligence officer for the British army, with posts in Romania, Greece, Syria, Lebanon, and Persia. After the war, he returned to England and wrote full time until his death. He married twice, the second time in 1942 to Ilona Zsoldos-Gutmán, with whom he had three children, a son and two daughters.
Household began writing in the 1920s and sold his first story to the Atlantic Monthly in 1936. His first novel, The Terror of Villadonga, was published during the same year. His first short story collection, The Salvation of Pisco Gabar and Other Stories, appeared in 1938. Altogether, Household wrote twenty-eight novels, including four for young adults; seven short story collections; and a volume of autobiography, Against the Wind (1958). Most of his novels are thrillers, and he is best known for Rogue Male (1939), which was filmed as Man Hunt in 1941 and as a TV movie under the novel’s original title in 1976.
