The Zemblanity Saga
by Zach Miles
Fresh out of university, Englishman Daniel Sagar arrives in Hong Kong on the eve of its 1997 handover for a high-stakes corporate role. A chance encounter draws him into the orbit of the Governor’s beautiful and enigmatic daughter, Louise Taylor, and the rarefied world of the city’s elite. But when Daniel stumbles across a trail of murder, corruption, and espionage, he finds himself navigating a city of shadows—where trust is fatal, love is dangerous, and the truth could cost him everything.
HURRICANE YORK
A novel by Zach Miles
Whispers of a dead muse stir a storm on empire’s last days.
Hong Kong, 1995. The empire is dying, and the clock is running out.
Daniel Sagar, a 25-year-old British graduate, arrives in the Far East on a fast-track management program. On paper, it’s a dream posting—prestige, power, and a front-row seat to history as the Union Jack prepares to fall. But when Daniel stumbles upon the aftershock of a double murder—an English barrister and a high-end Russian escort—his carefully mapped future begins to splinter.
Haunted by the girl’s mutilated body and the secrets it may conceal, Daniel is drawn into a tightening web of coincidence, corruption, and danger. At the centre are twelve names—men of wealth, influence, and bloodied hands—and a missing file that could expose them all. As he digs deeper, helped by a brilliant hacker flatmate and shadowed by intelligence operatives with shifting agendas, Daniel must navigate the city’s labyrinth of secrets: colonial boardrooms, secret societies, digital surveillance, and a forbidden love affair with the Governor’s daughter.
With the 1997 Handover looming and sovereignty slipping through colonial fingers, Daniel finds himself on the frontline of a war fought not with guns—but with data, blackmail, and betrayal.
From the yacht clubs of the Peak to the brothels of Macau, from the vaults of the Land Registry to the underground dens of Smuggler’s Ridge, Hurricane York is a politically charged, noir-tinged thriller about the death of empire and the cost of conscience.
It is also a love story. And a reckoning.
Themes & Audience
1990s Hong Kong, Handover thriller, post-colonial noir, political conspiracy, international espionage, hacker thriller, dark romance, literary fiction, millennial fiction, historical thriller, British colonialism, atmospheric suspense, Black Mirror meets Le Carré.
Debut novelist Zach Miles blends 30 years of storytelling expertise with two decades of research to create Hurricane York, the first book in a tense, politically charged trilogy.
Zach Miles is a debut novelist with a 30-year background in advertising and storytelling, known for crafting emotionally resonant narratives with cinematic precision. His first novel, Hurricane York, is the culmination of over two decades of meticulous research, set against the politically volatile backdrop of 1990s Hong Kong. Drawing inspiration from noir thrillers, espionage dramas, and the rise of globalisation at the turn of the millennium, the book unravels a mystery steeped in corruption, lost ideals, and doomed love. As the opening volume in the Zemblanity Saga, Hurricane York sets the tone for a sweeping trilogy that fuses suspense, romance, and political intrigue into a hauntingly modern epic.