NEW THRILLERS
Bonn ton
PETER PARLEY
The Bang Bang Birds Adam Diment (Michael Joseph 25s) Spy in Camera Richard Grayson (John Long 22s 6d) The Nathan Hale John R. Vorhies (Neville Spearman 25s) Dance of the Dwarfs Geoffrey Household (Michael Joseph 25s) Forfeit Dick Francis (Michael Joseph 25s) The Man Whose Dreams Came True Julian Symons (Collins 21s)
This is John Le Carre's fifth low-voltage thriller to date and all of them have been sidling closer and closer to the straight novel. By low voltage I mean sparing of thrills rather than lacking in intensity, for the plots grow thicker and the characters more opaque every time. Le Cane eschews the skydiving, underwater, mini-rocket thrills of the comic-strip thriller in favour of the far more sinister and engrossing chicanery of the civil service. No eager boffins press tran- sistorised death rays into the horny palms of luckless agents, no svelte mulattoes await the palpitating touch of the head of Smersh. All is quiet on the Le Carre front save for the scratch- ing of the poison pen and the dropped-pin sound of malicious innuendo. A Small Town in Germany shows Le Carre almost over-extend- ing himself in his attempt to give form and sub- stance to the petty fears and ambitions of diplo- matic bureaucracy.
The small town of the title is dismal, dank Bonn, 'a developed wilderness . . . the waiting house for Berlin.' Alan Turner, a boorish, insen- sitive but ruthless member of Foreign Office security is sent out from London to retrieve Leo Hartung, a long-service member of Chancery who has absconded with vital files on the eve of delicate Common Market negotiations. The career diplomats resent his presence as they re- sented Leo Hartung, who worked his way up from office boy to a quasi-official and unrecog- nised position of real power below the stars by doing all the jobs no one else would touch. Hunter and hunted find themselves increasingly in sympathy as Turner realises that there is a strong lobby in the embassy which would prefer not to see Hartung or the files again. Turner probes and worries away at these discordant tin:sees, wearing down the polished exteriors of the diplomats until they reveal sensitive areas and a host of private fears. The plot gets deeper and murkier until one doubts the possibility of any solution. The final revelations are so well considered that it would be positively churlish to give the game away.
The Bang Bang Birds is a romp of gleeful absurdity, offering ample scope to hero Philip McAlpine's numerous potentialities. The rather tissuey plot concerns a network of exclusive clubs run by the predictably grotesque Comte Henry de Vitconne, 'one of the weirdest things you could see away from a bad LSD trip.' The Aviary clubs exist to extract saleable infor- mation from prominent men in unguarded moments through the wiles of the female staff, known as Birds. 1st) trips, both good and bad, abound and McAlpine runs smartly through the pages, discarding odd bits of lacy finery here and there and manfully coping with the oppo- sition which comes in a variety of disguises. It is, it must be admitted, a fairly jolly read.
Richard Grayson's Spy in Camera follows a by now familiar pattern of the non-professional agent induced to act as courier or letter. box for information and rapidly getting out of his depth. The pawn on this particular chess board is a layabout, long resident in the South of France, who lasts a shorter time than most on his first Moscow assignment. Much of the book is taken up with the usual lengthy brainwash- ing process and only at the very end is there any departure from the standard gambit, with a twist which is quite chillingly macabre.
The Nathan Hale is a new piece of Strange- loveiana. An American nuclear submarine with enough armament to count as a nuclear power nes off course under the direction of its com- mander, Harris Hawk, who intends to imple- ment his own rather messianic plans foi- world peace at missile point. The action is tense and reasonably gripping with the factual material presented in the form of newspaper clippings, government records and interviews in the manner of the courtroom scene so beloved of American novelists.
I have always thought Geoffrey Household one of the most accomplished of thriller writers, ever since Rogue Male put him firmly in the Ambler class. His latest book, Dance of the Dwarfs, is an offbeat tale of a peaceful agronomist working at a remote station in South America where the grasslands meet the tropical forest. His life is simple and largely routine, punctuated by the occasional appearance of government forces or roving guerrillas. When he is found dead, together with his mistress, suspicion falls on the guerrillas but, as the book slowly reveals, their demise was brought about by quite another agency. Mr Household has a true hunter's feeling for his quarry and is a master at laying a trail of barely perceptible clues for his reader. This is not a book to suit all tastes but Household fans should not miss it.
Dick Francis was evidently born with a love for the turf and has made a speciality of thrillers with a racing theme. The hero of For- fell is a racing correspondent with a crippled wife and a roving eye. Rapidly enmeshed in a clever ante-post betting conspiracy, his life and that of his wife, tied to an iron lung, :ire thre-gened by a particularly unscrupulous gang -of hoodlums. Good cliffhanging stuff with a knowledgeable racing mire en scene. The Man Whose Dreams Came True is a splendid tale, one of Julian Symons's best for some time. Tony Scott-Williams, ne Jones, is.at heart one of nature's innocents but maintains desperate pose as a man of the world with a, Jeinite eye for the main chance. Leaving his post as amanuensis to a retired General after an opt piece of cheque forgery, he is as putty in the hands of a conniving woman whose plans for him are rather more enterprising than his for her. Scott-Williams, renamed Bain.Truscott io suit his latest aspirations, is dogged continu- ally by gambling debts and finds himself nicely set up as the prime suspect in a murder case. His escape from this predicament and final un- happy fate is handled with Mr Symons's char- acteristic skill.
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