WILBUR Smith's last blockbuster Monsoon was a record-breaking Number One Best-seller and more than over one million copies.

Warlock is his stunning and meticulously researched new best-seller set in Ancient Egypt which follows on from River of God and The Seventh Scroll.

After the death of his beloved Queen Lostris, Taita performs the rites of embalmment and burial for her.

Then, stricken with grief, he retreats into the forbidding deserts of North Africa where he becomes a hermit. Over the years that follow he devotes himself to the study of the mysteries of the occult until, armed with these extraordinary powers, he gradually transforms himself into the Warlock.

When he is called upon to save the dynasty of Queen Lostris from the clouds of evil that loom over Egypt he discovers that there has, after all, been a divine purpose in his bereavement and suffering.

Wilbur Smith was born in Central Africa in 1933. He was educated at Michaelhouse and Rhodes University.

He became a full-time writer in 1964 after the successful publication of When the Lion Feeds in 1964, and has since written 27 novels. (Macmillan £18.99).