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Judgment on Deltchev
Foster is hired to cover the trial of Deltchev, who is accused of treason for allegedly being a member of the sinister and secretive Brotherhood and preparing a plot to assassinate the head of state whilst President of the Agrarian Socialist Party and member of the Provisional Government. It is assumed to be a show trial, but when Foster encounters Madame Deltchev the plot thickens, with his and other lives in danger ....
291 pages, Kindle Edition
First published August 12, 1951
53 people are currently reading
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About the author
Eric Ambler
99 books486 followersSuspense novels of noted English writer Eric Ambler include
Passage of Arms
(1959).
Eric Ambler began his career in the early 1930s and quickly established a reputation as a thriller of extraordinary depth and originality. People often credit him as the inventor of the modern political thriller, and John Le Carré once described him as "the source on which we all draw."
Ambler began his working life at an engineering firm and then at an advertising agency and meanwhile in his spare time worked on his ambition, plays. He first published in 1936 and turned full-time as his reputation. During the war, people seconded him to the film unit of the Army, where he among other projects authored The Way Ahead with Peter Ustinov.
He moved to Hollywood in 1957 and during eleven years to 1968 scripted some memorable films, A Night to Remember and The Cruel Sea, which won him an Oscar nomination.
In a career, spanning more than six decades, Eric Ambler authored 19 books, the crime writers' association awarded him its gold dagger award in 1960. Joan Harrison married him and co-wrote many screenplays of Alfred Hitchcock, who in fact organized their wedding.
Eric Ambler began his career in the early 1930s and quickly established a reputation as a thriller of extraordinary depth and originality. People often credit him as the inventor of the modern political thriller, and John Le Carré once described him as "the source on which we all draw."
Ambler began his working life at an engineering firm and then at an advertising agency and meanwhile in his spare time worked on his ambition, plays. He first published in 1936 and turned full-time as his reputation. During the war, people seconded him to the film unit of the Army, where he among other projects authored The Way Ahead with Peter Ustinov.
He moved to Hollywood in 1957 and during eleven years to 1968 scripted some memorable films, A Night to Remember and The Cruel Sea, which won him an Oscar nomination.
In a career, spanning more than six decades, Eric Ambler authored 19 books, the crime writers' association awarded him its gold dagger award in 1960. Joan Harrison married him and co-wrote many screenplays of Alfred Hitchcock, who in fact organized their wedding.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 61 reviews
August 5, 2013
Wickely smart..., flawlessly and intricately contructed..., and a truly profound analysis and anatomy of the psychology of tyranny and power. Utterly believable.
A masterpiece of the genre.
A masterpiece of the genre.
April 10, 2016
"It's in the nature of this judicial system that one is condemned not only in innocence but also in ignorance."
- Franz Kafka, The Trial
I might need to rethink this and give it five stars. It is still gnawing at me a couple days later. Ambler's thriller centers on a British poet that travels to a Balkan/Eastern European dictatorship to cover the show trial of Papa Deltchev for treason.
It is a thriller that owes a lot to Kafka, Nabokov, Koestler, and to Buchan's The 39 Steps. Ambler slowly unravels the conspiracy wrapped around conspiracy as Foster (the poet narrator) uncovers the truth about the former leader and his family. It is hard to read these Ambler novels without seeing the future novels by le Carré, Furst, & Steinhauer standing behind every closed door and lurking in every dark shadow. The post WWII Ambler novels seem to engage in the same type of shift that happened to le Carré post 9/11. The world gets thrown off center a bit and Ambler sees a new type of enemy, a new darkness, a new shadow to explore. Amber shifts from Hitler and Fascism to the Soviet Union and totalitarianism like le Carré pivoted from the Soviet Union and totalitarianism to terrorism and eventually to the problems within our own oligarchy and bureaucracy. I love writers who can move, shake, and keep up.
Anyway, the novel is worth the read just for the kangaroo court scenes.
___________________
- Franz Kafka, The Trial
I might need to rethink this and give it five stars. It is still gnawing at me a couple days later. Ambler's thriller centers on a British poet that travels to a Balkan/Eastern European dictatorship to cover the show trial of Papa Deltchev for treason.
It is a thriller that owes a lot to Kafka, Nabokov, Koestler, and to Buchan's The 39 Steps. Ambler slowly unravels the conspiracy wrapped around conspiracy as Foster (the poet narrator) uncovers the truth about the former leader and his family. It is hard to read these Ambler novels without seeing the future novels by le Carré, Furst, & Steinhauer standing behind every closed door and lurking in every dark shadow. The post WWII Ambler novels seem to engage in the same type of shift that happened to le Carré post 9/11. The world gets thrown off center a bit and Ambler sees a new type of enemy, a new darkness, a new shadow to explore. Amber shifts from Hitler and Fascism to the Soviet Union and totalitarianism like le Carré pivoted from the Soviet Union and totalitarianism to terrorism and eventually to the problems within our own oligarchy and bureaucracy. I love writers who can move, shake, and keep up.
Anyway, the novel is worth the read just for the kangaroo court scenes.
___________________
June 20, 2011
A British playwright travels to an Easter European dictatorship, recruited to cover the ‘kangaroo court’ trial of that country’s former Prime Minister. Not a professional journalist, a stranger to the country, and smugly ensconced within his own bourgeois worldview, our hero is totally unprepared for the denouement that follows . . .
Graham Greene himself has acknowledged Eric Ambler as a master of the thriller. JUDGMENT ON DELTCHEV (while not usually counted among Ambler’s best work) is a perfect example of just what separates his novels from the rest of the pack.
The typical hero of an Ambler novel is an Everyman, an Average Joe – not a Rambo or Einstein in the lot – and JUDGMENT ON DELTCHEV is no exception. Although our hero is a keen observer of his surroundings, and (he thinks) a fairly astute judge & student of human character & nature, the certainties of his preconceptions quickly turn out to be potentially fatal liabilities in JUDGMENT ON DELTCHEV, because, (as in all Ambler’s work) it seems someone has changed all the rules while our hero wasn’t looking, and were not polite enough to let him know.
THAT’S Ambler’s specialty, the banal initial veneer of pedestrian detail that lulls the reader to sleep, that lets you think you know just what’s going on and just where you stand in the scheme of things – but then the human darkness beneath bubbles through a weak point in the facade, and you’re running for your life through a distorted nightmare parody of a world you thought you understood.
In JUDGMENT ON DELTCHEV, as in all other Ambler novels, no one is who or what they seem, all is deception, and no event can be taken at face value. The only certainty in Ambler’s universe is that a single misstep, even if made by a clueless innocent, can have dire (and often fatal) consequences. In the world of Eric Ambler, the lightest conversation about the most trivial details can actually be a frantic exercise in mutual deception, with death as the penalty for failure to convince.
Besides the pretense of banality, Ambler also depends on plot twists that rival the agility of a mountain goat escaping from a predator, and so any review risks choosing between either frustrating vagueness, or of spoiling the seemingly endless parade of nasty surprises. Suffice it to say that, in JUDGMENT ON DELTCHEV, it becomes clear at the end not only that the hero is not actually the hero, but that even the noblest deeds can be muddled by moral ambiguity, or possibly even inspired by delusions of the most pathetic nature.
Eric Ambler WAS a master, and JUDGMENT ON DELTCHEV is a worthy minor gem, an example of his work worth reading for its sheer noir sensibility, or to savor Ambler’s techniques of suspense. I highly recommend it, and him.
* * *
Pearce Hansen is the author of STREET RAISED, available now for the Kindle.
Graham Greene himself has acknowledged Eric Ambler as a master of the thriller. JUDGMENT ON DELTCHEV (while not usually counted among Ambler’s best work) is a perfect example of just what separates his novels from the rest of the pack.
The typical hero of an Ambler novel is an Everyman, an Average Joe – not a Rambo or Einstein in the lot – and JUDGMENT ON DELTCHEV is no exception. Although our hero is a keen observer of his surroundings, and (he thinks) a fairly astute judge & student of human character & nature, the certainties of his preconceptions quickly turn out to be potentially fatal liabilities in JUDGMENT ON DELTCHEV, because, (as in all Ambler’s work) it seems someone has changed all the rules while our hero wasn’t looking, and were not polite enough to let him know.
THAT’S Ambler’s specialty, the banal initial veneer of pedestrian detail that lulls the reader to sleep, that lets you think you know just what’s going on and just where you stand in the scheme of things – but then the human darkness beneath bubbles through a weak point in the facade, and you’re running for your life through a distorted nightmare parody of a world you thought you understood.
In JUDGMENT ON DELTCHEV, as in all other Ambler novels, no one is who or what they seem, all is deception, and no event can be taken at face value. The only certainty in Ambler’s universe is that a single misstep, even if made by a clueless innocent, can have dire (and often fatal) consequences. In the world of Eric Ambler, the lightest conversation about the most trivial details can actually be a frantic exercise in mutual deception, with death as the penalty for failure to convince.
Besides the pretense of banality, Ambler also depends on plot twists that rival the agility of a mountain goat escaping from a predator, and so any review risks choosing between either frustrating vagueness, or of spoiling the seemingly endless parade of nasty surprises. Suffice it to say that, in JUDGMENT ON DELTCHEV, it becomes clear at the end not only that the hero is not actually the hero, but that even the noblest deeds can be muddled by moral ambiguity, or possibly even inspired by delusions of the most pathetic nature.
Eric Ambler WAS a master, and JUDGMENT ON DELTCHEV is a worthy minor gem, an example of his work worth reading for its sheer noir sensibility, or to savor Ambler’s techniques of suspense. I highly recommend it, and him.
* * *
Pearce Hansen is the author of STREET RAISED, available now for the Kindle.
February 6, 2017
Since reading Journey into Fear and the other 5 of Eric Ambler’s pre-war series I have become a big fan of his work; his later novels, randomly chosen, have not disappointed me; until now.
The basic Ambler formula involves an amateur protagonist becoming inadvertently entangled with professional crooks or terrorists or secret agents. He stumbles upon political intrigue, and criminal subterfuge. He must survive by his wits, and – a small moral imperative – thwart their evil ends in the process.
Typically set in Europe and the Middle East, Ambler’s contemporary geopolitical knowledge generally provides excellent reading in itself – factually authentic, informative and interesting. But not so, Judgment on Deltchev.
The alarm bells were set ringing for me at the outset, when I realised the location was a fictitious Balkan state. In this vague context the scenes lacked their usual crisp outlines, and the narrative strained and creaked in search of credibility.
That characters seemed correspondingly faceless was exacerbated by the author’s choice of names – imagine trying to remember just who is who when you have Petkov, Pashik, Petlarov, Prochaska and Pazar. Phew!
But the overarching problem is that a great and intricately woven backcloth overwhelms the main thread of the plot. (In short, a complex and lengthy show-trial, a post-war purge, linked to coup and counter-coup).
Night after night on my Kindle, I set a record for falling asleep and having to retrace my steps. I almost gave up. Thankfully, some judicious ‘sleep-reading’ (flipping the pages while unconscious) got me through to the end.
The basic Ambler formula involves an amateur protagonist becoming inadvertently entangled with professional crooks or terrorists or secret agents. He stumbles upon political intrigue, and criminal subterfuge. He must survive by his wits, and – a small moral imperative – thwart their evil ends in the process.
Typically set in Europe and the Middle East, Ambler’s contemporary geopolitical knowledge generally provides excellent reading in itself – factually authentic, informative and interesting. But not so, Judgment on Deltchev.
The alarm bells were set ringing for me at the outset, when I realised the location was a fictitious Balkan state. In this vague context the scenes lacked their usual crisp outlines, and the narrative strained and creaked in search of credibility.
That characters seemed correspondingly faceless was exacerbated by the author’s choice of names – imagine trying to remember just who is who when you have Petkov, Pashik, Petlarov, Prochaska and Pazar. Phew!
But the overarching problem is that a great and intricately woven backcloth overwhelms the main thread of the plot. (In short, a complex and lengthy show-trial, a post-war purge, linked to coup and counter-coup).
Night after night on my Kindle, I set a record for falling asleep and having to retrace my steps. I almost gave up. Thankfully, some judicious ‘sleep-reading’ (flipping the pages while unconscious) got me through to the end.
March 1, 2010
I've read so many beautifully written books lately that this was disappointing. It's adequately written yet it never sings. Still, the plot, once it gets going, is damn good, and the writer has a wonderful command of real-world intrigue. The protagonist, who is a playwright working as a journalist, is the proper mix of heedless naif and sharp observer. The plot is damn clever and a lot of fun, and the book takes some interesting chances with the timeline, realpolitik, and murky and opaque character motivations. Again, it's written well, and it's a damn fine book, but I've been spoiled lately by an endless succession of authors who craft word-magic, and Ambler, despite his vast talents, is not a word-magician. He's a decent craftsman who takes pride in his work, but he doesn't have that crazy streak of genius that I've been craving.
April 28, 2023
spionaggio, guerra fredda, tantissimi plot twist, bellissimo
March 22, 2017
I love Ambler but this was just so-so. But so-so Ambler is better than most other spy fiction.
February 27, 2025
This is a political thriller set immediately after the Second World War in a Balkan republic menaced by more powerful global powers. Deltchev is a widely admired politician, but is in opposition to the likely government. It's about hypocritical politicians and sincere ones - the book is slanted towards Deltchev being sincere - and the manipulation of justice to make it appear that Deltchev is a crook. At least, that's my interpretation, as a left-leaning liberal: it may read differently to someone more sympathetic to the right. Deltchev may have been guilty of at least some wrongdoing, or he may be the victim of a frame. It's all rather ambiguous: typical Ambler territory.
September 15, 2019
Had I read Judgment on Deltchev before his other postwar novels, I think I would have clearly understood where Ambler is coming from. It's not just the experience and brutality of World War II that changed the upbeat tone of his prewar works into something more sinister laden. It's his seeing how Communist liberation was destroying the Balkans and the area of Europe he seems so enamored with.
This novel turns around an assassination. But it's not so much the actual assassination that is at the heart of the plot per se but the assassination of ideals. This novel makes an interesting complement, in a way, to Koestler's Darkness at Noon. In both, the beliefs that furthered commitment to communism twist back upon themselves and end not in tragedy but in obscure destruction of the soul.
The plot of Judgment on Deltchev does plod a bit towards the end and engage in excessive explanations. But the story and lesson from it is worth it.
This novel turns around an assassination. But it's not so much the actual assassination that is at the heart of the plot per se but the assassination of ideals. This novel makes an interesting complement, in a way, to Koestler's Darkness at Noon. In both, the beliefs that furthered commitment to communism twist back upon themselves and end not in tragedy but in obscure destruction of the soul.
The plot of Judgment on Deltchev does plod a bit towards the end and engage in excessive explanations. But the story and lesson from it is worth it.
November 15, 2017
Thank you to Crime Classics Advance Readers' Club for the free copy.
Unfortunately, I did not enjoy this novel. I found the style rather ponderous and was not gripped by the story which had an intricate interweaving of plot and subplot but was basically about a show trial.
I have tried Eric Ambler before and now reach the conclusion that his thrillers are not for me.
Unfortunately, I did not enjoy this novel. I found the style rather ponderous and was not gripped by the story which had an intricate interweaving of plot and subplot but was basically about a show trial.
I have tried Eric Ambler before and now reach the conclusion that his thrillers are not for me.
July 23, 2022
It's a complicated story, but well worth the effort to follow the plot. The vocation of the main character is unique (playwright assigned a journalist's task), but perhaps the editor realized that such a person would be a perfect choice to cover a Soviet-bloc show trial.
November 14, 2018
Running a functioning democracy is tough. It’s even tougher when you’ve never run one before. Tougher still if you are trying to forge one after a devastating war. This is made even harder by being in a fictional Balkan country. Now on top of all that if your functioning democracy isn’t even really a functioning democracy but rather a thinly veiled repressive authoritarian single party dictatorship, well, that could get you killed.
Possibly getting themselves killed is a situation in which both Deltchev, the titular one time party leader of a fictitious Balkan country, and Foster, a writers-blocked professional London playwright, find themselves. Each for very different reasons. Deltchev is on trial for planning the assassination of the head of state and his political rival. Foster has been hired, for unknown reasons, by an American paper to cover the trial. While Deltchev must be prepared for what the prosecution throws at him, Foster must try and avoid the machinations of Deltchev’s opponents as he fails to fall for the story being spun and tries to find the truth.
This is the seventh book I’ve read by Eric Ambler, these include; Epitaph for a Spy, The Light of Day, Journey into Fear, Passage of Arms, A Coffin for Dimitrios, and The Schirmer Inheritance. Of those, I’ve reviewed three (Epitaph for a Spy, The Schirmer Inheritance, and Passage of Arms) although two of those were crappy two sentence reviews that shouldn’t really count. Looking back at all seven of these books, the reviews I did make - such as some of them are - and the ratings I’ve given the books (so many stars out of five - why five I wonder and why stars...) the one constant I see thus far is that Eric Ambler is a very good writer. He is, however, only a very good writer.
Now, you may ask, what do you mean by that and is there something wrong with being a very good writer. There is really nothing wrong with being a very good writer. I aspire to be at least a very good writer myself one day. One of the reasons I’m writing more extensive reviews now.
That being said, he is just a very good writer. He is not perfect. He is not always incredible. He is not even consistently great. He is just... very good.
One of the things that makes him stand out is he is the father, or more likely grandfather, of the modern thriller novel. Clive Cussler, John le Carre, and Tom Clancy wouldn’t exist if it were not for Ambler working up the the basics of the genre prior to World War 2.
So when I read an Eric Ambler book I expect a very good book. Which is why this one seems to be so disappointing to me. It’s not a very good book. It is really just a passable book. Most of the elements of a very good Ambler thriller are there; the man out of his depth, political intrigue with factions in conflict that are on the edge of exploding, and a mysterious and strong female character. Unfortunately, none of the elements seem to click correctly either on their own or with each other.
Our man out of his depth, this time the aforementioned well known British playwright, seems to be only ankle deep as opposed the usual waist - or even better - neck deep that other Ambler protagonist get. Although he reacts poorly to seeing a dead body, we do find out that he can handle himself well being shot at as he has been under fire before during the war. Additionally, unlike most of the other main characters in Ambler’s other books, he seems to be actively searching out the problem instead of just trying to survive it. What fun would Jack Ryan be if he simply pursued the bad guy instead of having to fend the bad guy off because the bad guy became a personal as well as international threat.
Likewise, the political intrigue and the opposing forces barely touch Foster as he follows the clues. Instead of being sucked deeper into the maelstrom of the political machinations, he is considered more of an annoyance by the political powers at play in our fictional Balkan country. He even uses that perception to convince the evil socialist plotters he is unimportant and actively get himself out of trouble. No being pushed deeper into the plot as he accidentally drives himself further into the fray.
Finally, although there are potentially two separate femme fatales in this story, mother and daughter this time, they are the least active female protagonists Ambler has ever created. They are immobile to the point of actually being under house arrest. The mother is never seen outside of her room let alone her house and often remains seated the entire time she interacts with Foster. The daughter is used as a plot device to force the dead body into the story. Even when she manages to be active - by escaping from captivity to see Foster - it is docile and quite frankly a rather feeble exercise. She climbs a tree to get out over her own garden wall. When she does show up in our heros bed, she is asleep and fully clothed. She provides only a plot point that any of a number of other characters in the story could have easily provided.
This is one of the first books that Ambler wrote after World War 2 that I have read. The other books were either written before the war or a few years after this one. Perhaps Ambler just needed some time to refine his style for a post war world. Both the earlier and the later books seem to have a better balance. The characters are firmer in their capabilities and those capabilities help further the story with less disruption, an even consistency, and with a touch more believability.
At least I hope that this is the case. I have three more Eric Ambler novels in my collection yet to read. The Night-Comers, The Levanter, and The Care of Time. These three books were written from 1956 to 1981 respectively. If my assumption is accurate than Ambler should have found his groove once again and I can enjoy a very good book, written well.
Possibly getting themselves killed is a situation in which both Deltchev, the titular one time party leader of a fictitious Balkan country, and Foster, a writers-blocked professional London playwright, find themselves. Each for very different reasons. Deltchev is on trial for planning the assassination of the head of state and his political rival. Foster has been hired, for unknown reasons, by an American paper to cover the trial. While Deltchev must be prepared for what the prosecution throws at him, Foster must try and avoid the machinations of Deltchev’s opponents as he fails to fall for the story being spun and tries to find the truth.
This is the seventh book I’ve read by Eric Ambler, these include; Epitaph for a Spy, The Light of Day, Journey into Fear, Passage of Arms, A Coffin for Dimitrios, and The Schirmer Inheritance. Of those, I’ve reviewed three (Epitaph for a Spy, The Schirmer Inheritance, and Passage of Arms) although two of those were crappy two sentence reviews that shouldn’t really count. Looking back at all seven of these books, the reviews I did make - such as some of them are - and the ratings I’ve given the books (so many stars out of five - why five I wonder and why stars...) the one constant I see thus far is that Eric Ambler is a very good writer. He is, however, only a very good writer.
Now, you may ask, what do you mean by that and is there something wrong with being a very good writer. There is really nothing wrong with being a very good writer. I aspire to be at least a very good writer myself one day. One of the reasons I’m writing more extensive reviews now.
That being said, he is just a very good writer. He is not perfect. He is not always incredible. He is not even consistently great. He is just... very good.
One of the things that makes him stand out is he is the father, or more likely grandfather, of the modern thriller novel. Clive Cussler, John le Carre, and Tom Clancy wouldn’t exist if it were not for Ambler working up the the basics of the genre prior to World War 2.
So when I read an Eric Ambler book I expect a very good book. Which is why this one seems to be so disappointing to me. It’s not a very good book. It is really just a passable book. Most of the elements of a very good Ambler thriller are there; the man out of his depth, political intrigue with factions in conflict that are on the edge of exploding, and a mysterious and strong female character. Unfortunately, none of the elements seem to click correctly either on their own or with each other.
Our man out of his depth, this time the aforementioned well known British playwright, seems to be only ankle deep as opposed the usual waist - or even better - neck deep that other Ambler protagonist get. Although he reacts poorly to seeing a dead body, we do find out that he can handle himself well being shot at as he has been under fire before during the war. Additionally, unlike most of the other main characters in Ambler’s other books, he seems to be actively searching out the problem instead of just trying to survive it. What fun would Jack Ryan be if he simply pursued the bad guy instead of having to fend the bad guy off because the bad guy became a personal as well as international threat.
Likewise, the political intrigue and the opposing forces barely touch Foster as he follows the clues. Instead of being sucked deeper into the maelstrom of the political machinations, he is considered more of an annoyance by the political powers at play in our fictional Balkan country. He even uses that perception to convince the evil socialist plotters he is unimportant and actively get himself out of trouble. No being pushed deeper into the plot as he accidentally drives himself further into the fray.
Finally, although there are potentially two separate femme fatales in this story, mother and daughter this time, they are the least active female protagonists Ambler has ever created. They are immobile to the point of actually being under house arrest. The mother is never seen outside of her room let alone her house and often remains seated the entire time she interacts with Foster. The daughter is used as a plot device to force the dead body into the story. Even when she manages to be active - by escaping from captivity to see Foster - it is docile and quite frankly a rather feeble exercise. She climbs a tree to get out over her own garden wall. When she does show up in our heros bed, she is asleep and fully clothed. She provides only a plot point that any of a number of other characters in the story could have easily provided.
This is one of the first books that Ambler wrote after World War 2 that I have read. The other books were either written before the war or a few years after this one. Perhaps Ambler just needed some time to refine his style for a post war world. Both the earlier and the later books seem to have a better balance. The characters are firmer in their capabilities and those capabilities help further the story with less disruption, an even consistency, and with a touch more believability.
At least I hope that this is the case. I have three more Eric Ambler novels in my collection yet to read. The Night-Comers, The Levanter, and The Care of Time. These three books were written from 1956 to 1981 respectively. If my assumption is accurate than Ambler should have found his groove once again and I can enjoy a very good book, written well.
March 2, 2013
Ambler uses his usual set up here--an innocent abroad, stumbling into danger, intrigue, and corruption, his heedless naivete making him dangerous. So far, so smart and so thrilling. But it's the structure of this book that really makes it good. The ending felt quite anticlimactic at first, but the real ending is buried back in chapter 14, when the narrator mentions, quite out of narrative order, what the actual consequences of his dangerous foray into eastern European politics were. The temporal structure of this is really complicated and wonderful, and I found that the book resonated in my mind long after I had finished it.
May 14, 2014
When I recieved this book as a gift from a co worker, I expected something that would be an amusing period piece. Surprisingly it is less so than I had thought. Yordan Deltchev, the prominent politician and resident of the Balkans, is on trial in Red Russia for supporting plans in post war Europe which would have minimized the success of Russia to fill the void left by the collapse of Nazi Germany.
I read this book during Pennsic War xxxv, and could not put it down. It is well written and very engaging.
I read this book during Pennsic War xxxv, and could not put it down. It is well written and very engaging.
April 16, 2015
One of Ambler's better Cold War era thrillers. This one centres around the show trial of a supposed traitor to a fictional Eastern European state, and the political muck that's raked up in its wake. Like a lot of the best Amblers it's fast paced and well-plotted, with an interesting and shady group of characters and a morally ambiguous tone that prefigures the works of writers like le Carre and Deighton.
September 6, 2019
This book was written in a reaction to the sham trials by the Communists in Eastern Europe. The narrator's motivations in exposing himself to danger is to my mind not well articulated and although the plot has some interesting twists, it requires way too much exposition in the end to wrap things up.
August 4, 2015
Only Ambler book that I've abandoned before finishing. Just didn't grab me as others have, much too much didactic exposition in the first 40 pages; didn't get further.
November 12, 2017
I was delighted to be sent this novel by Crime Classics Advance Readers Club in return for an honest review. I’ve had a box set of three of Eric Ambler’s books on my Kindle for some time and this was a good prompt to get started.
. First published in 1977 this is a tale of a show trial in an imaginary and unnamed Eastern European state at the height of Communism. Now that the Cold War is over, the Iron Curtain lifted and the Berlin Wall demolished, we are looking into an era that has passed. This can be both fascinating or of little interest today, depending on one’s view point. I was prepared to be deeply interested, but instead found the first third of the book a struggle.. There are lengthy descriptions of places, events and people which while setting the scene did at times, get a bit too much. It slowed the action down. I found my concentration wandering more than once and had to reread a sentence or paragraph.. For instance we are given a full, minute description of a room that the narrator has just entered.. Whilst it set the scene for the reader, he couldn’t possibly have taken all this in on first entering. I wanted to speed things up by his interaction with the person he had come to see. This happens time and again. There is much deep pondering on convoluted Eastern country political plots, so complex it sometimes became difficult to follow. And the plethora of Russian names didn’t help either. On the positive side it was a joy to read well written English again after several “modern” books who’s writing often left something to be desired.. Although the chapters and paragraphs tended to be long, they were always well structured and crafted…By the final third of the novel I was surprised to find myself flipping the Kindle pages, keen to see how this extremely complex plot turned out.
The tale is narrated in the first person by an English playwright called Foster, who is commissioned to go to this Eastern European country to report on a major political trial. He is unable to send reports out and the only daily coverage reaching other countries is the state issued bulletins. He soon becomes drawn into the intrigue partly by his own naivety and partly by others machinations. Nothing is as it first appears and his life is soon in danger.. Despite early reservations I did enjoy this dip back into the not too distant past by a much respected craftsman in the art of the spy novel. I will now be reading his other two books on my Kindle - - - - -but no rush..
. First published in 1977 this is a tale of a show trial in an imaginary and unnamed Eastern European state at the height of Communism. Now that the Cold War is over, the Iron Curtain lifted and the Berlin Wall demolished, we are looking into an era that has passed. This can be both fascinating or of little interest today, depending on one’s view point. I was prepared to be deeply interested, but instead found the first third of the book a struggle.. There are lengthy descriptions of places, events and people which while setting the scene did at times, get a bit too much. It slowed the action down. I found my concentration wandering more than once and had to reread a sentence or paragraph.. For instance we are given a full, minute description of a room that the narrator has just entered.. Whilst it set the scene for the reader, he couldn’t possibly have taken all this in on first entering. I wanted to speed things up by his interaction with the person he had come to see. This happens time and again. There is much deep pondering on convoluted Eastern country political plots, so complex it sometimes became difficult to follow. And the plethora of Russian names didn’t help either. On the positive side it was a joy to read well written English again after several “modern” books who’s writing often left something to be desired.. Although the chapters and paragraphs tended to be long, they were always well structured and crafted…By the final third of the novel I was surprised to find myself flipping the Kindle pages, keen to see how this extremely complex plot turned out.
The tale is narrated in the first person by an English playwright called Foster, who is commissioned to go to this Eastern European country to report on a major political trial. He is unable to send reports out and the only daily coverage reaching other countries is the state issued bulletins. He soon becomes drawn into the intrigue partly by his own naivety and partly by others machinations. Nothing is as it first appears and his life is soon in danger.. Despite early reservations I did enjoy this dip back into the not too distant past by a much respected craftsman in the art of the spy novel. I will now be reading his other two books on my Kindle - - - - -but no rush..
April 17, 2023
A riveting and impressively structured realistic spy thriller, from the writer who single-handedly invented the genre (more or less). Controversial when first published (1951) because of its anti-communist themes, the book has aged better than I expected. Written in the shadow of show trials in communist satellite states, and at a time when many fellow travellers in the West were re-evaluating their loyalties, a certain level of political cynicism is probably justified. Still, it's striking how communism seems to be little more than empty pomp and sloganeering in "Judgement on Deltchev", especially given Ambler's own pre-war sympathies towards the USSR.
It's a politically inflected novel, sure, but its core is still good old-fashioned intrigue and subterfuge. There's much here that readers of Ambler's other novels will have come to expect, right down to the the accidental everyman protagonist. The novel conjures a world of post-war uncertainty with flair, and the twists are impeccably executed (if not always the most shocking). My main reservations were around the abrupt ending, which did a bit of a disservice to Ambler's excellent plotting; there's also a largely superfluous Lady Macbeth character, who seems to exist solely to blot the copybook of the novel's only Good Communist. Still, "Judgment on Deltchev" is much more than just an interesting period piece. This is a skilful and elegiac book, and it's brilliant to see it still in print more than 70 years after its publication.
It's a politically inflected novel, sure, but its core is still good old-fashioned intrigue and subterfuge. There's much here that readers of Ambler's other novels will have come to expect, right down to the the accidental everyman protagonist. The novel conjures a world of post-war uncertainty with flair, and the twists are impeccably executed (if not always the most shocking). My main reservations were around the abrupt ending, which did a bit of a disservice to Ambler's excellent plotting; there's also a largely superfluous Lady Macbeth character, who seems to exist solely to blot the copybook of the novel's only Good Communist. Still, "Judgment on Deltchev" is much more than just an interesting period piece. This is a skilful and elegiac book, and it's brilliant to see it still in print more than 70 years after its publication.
April 11, 2020
To think that this book is almost 70 years old, and it holds up so well. It is intricate and yet terse. Every passage is used to advance the narrative. It is not only a great demonstration of suspense writing, but great writing period. The characters are thoroughly credible. In a sense, there are no heroes or villains - people are formed by their experiences and set against the circumstances of place and history. Ambler is like a magician and uses misdirection to perfection. Petty dislikes and small prejudices lead the protagonist down a rabbit hole with the reader hard on his heals. Like LeCarre, small human decisions that go wrong are amplified by the desire to fix mistakes before discovery or a character's limited perspective. Initial misjudgments then snowball beyond hope of neat resolution. And isn't this the way of life? It is unfortunate that espionage writing more commonly follows the James Bond formula of a superhuman protagonist set in an implausible scenario resolving a crisis in an inconceivable way. Fortunately, Austin Powers has made this formula work well enough. As is is, I will read all the Ambler and LeCarre I can get my hands on.
October 16, 2017
Fabulous would put it alongside Mask of Dimitrios as in top notch Ambler...who never fails to entertain...but those two are in a different league for me in terms of the story and the manner in which it develops in terms of intrigue. Draws you in with all the characters beautifully drawn including Deltchev whom one never sees aside from in court...and the description of the court room and those present makes you think immediately of those grainy black and white images of all the show trials of that era before and after WWII. And in Pashik Ambler has introduced one of the most memorable complex characters I have come across in many a year. If there is an Ambler v Greene camp then I am firmly in the former and delighted I belatedly and finally made his acquaintance this year.
August 15, 2023
Oh my, what an exhilarating experience reading this book was. Ambler, despite many of his books being out of print, is an absolute master of political fiction, and whenever I find one secondhand, it goes right to the top of my ‘to read’ pile.
This novel, written at the height of the Stalinist trials, concerns a fictional trial in Eastern Europe, covered for a Western newspaper by a celebrated playwright. As so often in Amblers fiction, the main character is not a politician, spy, detective or assassin, but an ordinary bloke that finds himself mixed up in an incredible plot (in both senses of the word!). In fact, the story is so complicated, I reckon one would need to read it 2 or 3 times to really understand what’s going on.
Find a copy and read it!
This novel, written at the height of the Stalinist trials, concerns a fictional trial in Eastern Europe, covered for a Western newspaper by a celebrated playwright. As so often in Amblers fiction, the main character is not a politician, spy, detective or assassin, but an ordinary bloke that finds himself mixed up in an incredible plot (in both senses of the word!). In fact, the story is so complicated, I reckon one would need to read it 2 or 3 times to really understand what’s going on.
Find a copy and read it!
January 14, 2019
Dark and devious story around a show trial in post war Europe. What this story lacks in terms of physical action and pace it more than makes up in terms of the amount of intrigue and manouevering it packs into its pages. Gone are Ambler's pet props of stateless villains trying to peddle war secrets, and Russian agents with a friendly face. This is about back-door machinations through and through, where no one is sure who the man standing next to him or her is working for.
October 24, 2019
The first Ambler I have read that deals with post war issues, in this case a SE European authoritarian Communist/Socialist state. Though the scene has changed from pre-WWII to the Cold War era this remains classic Ambler and is a very entertaining read. The story of the trial of Deltchev reminds me of the Yugoslav trial of Draza Mihailovich by Tito's regime in 1946.
December 14, 2021
In a Soviet bloc country soon after World War II, the show trial of a politician fallen out of favor with the ruling party exposes a deadly conspiracy. Ambler tells a harrowing story of political intrigue that leads to terrible consequences for those involved and, perhaps, an entire country. Truly an 'edge of your seat' thriller.
February 26, 2023
Ambler weaves layer upon layer of intrigue and deceit. Just when you think you have the plot figured out, that's when you learn you haven't at all. Set in the grey concrete years of the Cold War, the authoritarian Soviet-style thugs of Deltchev's world seem, unfortunately, still eerily present in our own times.
November 15, 2019
Deftly woven plot, plenty of suspense, surprises galore, one or two a bit out of left field (though savvy detective fiction fans may spot the clues). Well done and worth the read for younger fans of the suspense/thriller genre who may think everything began with John LeCarre.
January 16, 2022
Leichte Lektüre, in 6 Stunden war ich durch. Der Anfang ist etwas anstrengend, weil man nicht versteht, wo das hinführen soll. Aber nach kurzer Zeit gewöhnt man sich an den Stil. Alles in allem eine nette Urlaubslektüre, ich werde mich nach weiteren Krimis von dem Author umschauen.
October 11, 2017
3.5 stars, rounded down
February 7, 2018
I've read one or two other books on the political intrigue in Eastern Europe during the Cold War. This one was the most believable of all the ones I've read.
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