THRILLS AND CHILLS

Press, Volume CVII, Issue 31542, 2 December 1967, Page 4

THRILLS AND CHILLS

Vandelyn’s Kindom. By J. L M. Stewart. Collins. 288 PPAfter a deceptively slow start J. I. M. Stewart's latest novel builds up to a suspensive not to say horrific climax. The book is really on two levels, the first showing the leisurely academic life of Oxford, and the second a private-ly-owned Greek Island In which disparate human elements are, to some extent, controlled by Bernard Vanderlyn—an idealistic American millionaire who has deserted the political sphere of his own country to conduct an experiment in Utopianism in the island of Tyros. Jeremy Shefford, young Oxford don, is bound up with both these widely different types of existence. He meets Bernard and his wife Louise when they visit Oxford on a culture tour, and a few years later is invited through a chance encounter with Mark Varley, whom he had known at . Oxford, to visit Vanderlyn’s “Kingdom” where Varley, a tempestuous poet, is living under the owner’s benevolent patronage. In the interim between these two encounters Louise has died, and Vanderlyn at the age of 82 has married Gemma, a seductively beautiful Greek girl. Marion Causland, Louise’s child by a calamitous first marriage, also lives with them. At first sight Bernard Vanderlyn’s plan for running a happy community—consisting of islanders whose material wellbeing is to be cared for, and visiting artists and writers are to be allowed leisure to pursue their own interests—seems viable enough. Underlying the surface smoothness, however, violent passions are brewing, in which Gemma Vanderlyn’s infidelity with an unknown lover, and Marion’s undisguised passion for Mark are eventually to provide a dramatic 'denouement. There is perhaps some slight ambiguity in the character of Vanderlyn himself. In spite of his two marriages no clue is given to his sexual experience —though it is revealed that in the first case there was none. His unjustified belief in Mark’s poetic genius seems also a little inexplicable in such- a well-integrated personality. But at least his reactions to the revelations concerning his wife’s, pregnancy, and his step-daughter's final predicament are natural, and in its dramatic context the final tragedy is Inevitable. The Money that Money Can’t Buy. By James Munro. Hammond. 224 pp.

James Munro, whose previous books about the adventures of John Craig have attracted favourable attention, has written some of the “Avengers” and the “Mogul” scripts for the television series. In this book John Craig, a member of the special branch of the Secret Service assigned to particularly unpleasant and tough jobs, is engaged in hunting down a group of wealthy men whose object is to damage Russia’s reputation. Several spacetravel projects have been sabotaged by these people in such a way that America and England are likely to be blamed and thus the chances of a shooting war will be greatly increased. All this has the support of Red China. The group is led by Simmons, a wealthy publisher, who came of good Baptist stock—but came too far. The story begins with a crash as a Chinese porter at a hotel in the Lake District leaps through a plateglass window only to be hit expeditiously and fatally on the head with an ice-axe. After all, you cannot ask for anything fairer than that Shortly afterwards a fast motorboat is pursued through the night by units of the Spanish navy as It makes a successful attempt to reach the safety of Gibraltar, and then a wildwest rodeo show, set up for television on Mr Simmons’s estate, involves Craig in a hoof-to-band encounter with a maddened bulk All this, together with several karate fights, leaves the reader scarcely a dull moment Finally Craig with full cooperation from the Russian secret service, robs a bank in Morocco where Simmons keeps a fighting fund of one million pounds. Those who enjoyed the author’s “The Man Who Sold Death” and “Die Rich, Die Happy” will welcome this sizzling sequel. Out of the Depths. By Leonard Holton. Hammond and Hammond. 185 PR-

In this book we are introduced to Father Joseph Bredder, a splendid addition to the long list of those who assist the police in their investigations. He reminds one of Chesterton’s Father Brown, except that he is physically large and tough. He and his friend. Lieutenant Minardi of the Los Angeles homicide squad, go fishing and catch a rubber boot belonging to a skin-diver, it is made noisome by its late owner’s foot still being in possession, and this rouses Father Bredder*s curiosity and Lieutenant Minardi’s professional attention. Their joint investigations lead to another killing, and Father Bredder comes under suspicion. He has no great difficulty in' allaying this, but his life is seriously endangered as he comes close to the heart of his search and gradually lays bare a plot against the nation’s security. Those who attack him have cause to regret that he was an ex-sergeant of the United States Marines before ordination, and is as conversant with unarmed combat as he is with his breviary. All whom he meets in friendship are warmed by the man’s broad human sympathies and by the disciplined order of his thinking which stems from his knowledge q( theology and of human

nature. He calls his guardian angel “Joe,” so that their relationship can be conducted on ,a friendly footing. The way in which philosophic observations are tossed naturally into the story calls to mind parts of “Trent’s Last Case,” although this story is not so complicated. Mr Holton, whose real name is Leonard Wibberley, gives quite a lot of interesting information about skin-diving in the development of the story. It is to be hoped that Father Bredder will frequently be met again in the future. Maigret and the Headless Corpse. By Simenon. Hamish Hamilton. 170 pp.

Written in 1055, this book has just been translated into English by Eileen Ellenbogen, and will attract and satisfy Simenon’s many admirers. Maigret’s unremitting attention to all details of routine investigation, together with his finelytuned flair for sensing the importance of what may be slightly unusual, and with his broad sympathy for erring human nature, brings him fairly quickly to the solution of a mystery which begins with the discovery in a canal of a man’s arm wrapped in paper. That is all Maigret has, and it isn’t much. His enquiries branch out from thia unpromising centre with the ordered sequential pattern of a spider’s web whose strands

bold fast to some pitiful characters so _ brilliantly sketched out with few but firm and dear lines—who wriggle only faintly and quite uselessly. The background to it all, set in a pleasant countryside far from the sordid streets and bistros of the 10th. arrondissement, does much to explain and to arouse sympathy, and is presented with Simenon's nnfailingly logical symmetry.

My Lovely Executioner. By Peter Rabe. Herbert Jenkins. 178 pp. The book opens with a grim description of a gaol-break in America. Gallivan had only three weeks to serve before he finished a seven years’ sentence and, naturally enough, did not want to break out. However, Rand, a fellow convict drags him by force through the melee and through an open gate. With so many bullets flying Inside, it was much safer to take the road. It soon appears that the escape had been most carefully planned, and that taking Gallivan along had been of the essence. What he knew, and how he could be of assistance to his newly-found friends who turn out to be dope runners, gradually emerges, though never completely convincingly. A girl. Jessie, assists in the escape and seems to be with if not of the gang. This book cannot be given a glowing recommendation.