James Rouch is best known authoring fictional war novels, notably those featuring 'The Zone', a hypothetical battleground in central Europe during World War III. The first of these was entitled Hard Target and was published in 1980, with ten novels so far published in the series. Rouch is a founding member of the literary adviser service, Author Management. Originally created as a literary agent service for new writers, Author Management has since become a literary and manuscript advisory company, providing authors with advice and assistance in polishing their writing and help in navigating the publishing industry. This change was predicated by the fact that Rouch suffered a leg amputation and could no longer travel as he once did as a literary agent. He currently resides in UK south coast resort and convention city of Bournemouth.

Three novels of the Second World War:

• Tiger (1979)
• Gateway to Hell (1979)
• The War Machines (1980)

• The Zone (series)

"The Zone" is a series of speculative fiction. Comprising ten novels, the series describes a conflict as it would have or might have been between Warsaw Pact forces and NATO of the 1980's and early 1990's in Europe. Part of the apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction World War III genre, the series takes it name from a large strip of no-mans land in West and East Germany where nuclear, biological and chemical weapons have been used by both sides indiscriminately, creating a contaminated wasteland. The novels follow the actions of a multi-national combat unit and its series of special missions during the course of the conflict through out this strip of ruined Europe.

The Zone 1- Hard Target (1980)

The Zone 2- Blind Fire (1980)

The Zone 3- Hunter-Killer (1981)

The Zone 4- Sky Strike (1981)

The Zone 5- Overkill (1982)

The Zone 6- Plague Bomb (1986)

The Zone 7- Killing Ground (1988)

The Zone 8- Civilian Slaughter (1989)

The Zone 9- Body Count (1990)

The Zone 10- Death March ( 2007: PDF version only)

The series was originally published by Kensington Books under the Zebra Books imprint. The tenth novel was published on-line in 2007 by the Australian online-publisher, Imprint, available only in PDF format. Imprint also has the current publishing rights to all ten of The Zone novels, reprinting them only online in PDF format.