From: JIM DOHERTY <
jimdohertyjr@yahoo.com>
> Subject: Re: RARA-AVIS: Reading list
>
> Eric,
>
> My own take on your reading list below:
>
> > Adam Hall - The Quiller Memorandum
>
> The first (and probably best) entry in my
all-time
> favorite spy series, it won the Edgar for
Best
> Mystery
> Novel and a French award in the same
category.
I'm amazed at how many people here like this series - so few
people seem to have. Elleston Trevor, the man who was Adam
Hall, was extraordinarily prolific - there are 19 in the
Quiller series. My favourites are the ones right after
Memorandum: The Ninth Directive, The Tango Briefing and The
Warsaw Document. Like the Helm series, they tended to get
more blockbuster as they went along. There's a heap of
information on Trevor and his career at www.quiller.net, and
there's a very active discussion group at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/quiller
- Trevor's son has posted a few times in the last
month.
> > Donald Hamilton - The Ambushers
> > The Ravagers
>
> If Quiller's number one in my estimation, he
only
> beat
> Matt Helm by a nose. I've thoroughly enjoyed
every
> Helm I've read, though the earlier,
tighter,
> pre-1976
> novels are more satsfying to me than the
later,
> longer
> entries that seem to be self-consciously
breaking
> for
> the "Ludlum blackbuster" category.
I agree entirely with this assessment. Randy may already have
plugged his Helm discussion group, but it deserves another,
and I know there are a lot of Hamilton fans here. It's
at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MattHelm
Both these groups operate on much the same lines as this, but
it can be a lot of fun to discuss one writer in detail with
other fans.
> > Martin Cruz Smith - Gorky Park
>
> Liked it. Didn't love it. It won the British
Crime
> Writers Golden Dagger bor Best Novel.
The next novel, Polar Star, is my favourite of the series:
Renko on a trawler in the Bering Straits. Smith has,
incidentally, finished his latest novel, set in pre-war Tokyo
- it''s called December 6 . When I spoke to him on the phone
a month or so ago, he was just sitting down to start work on
the fifth Renko novel, which will be set in Moscow again.
Jeremy
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