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Sean Dillon #3

On Dangerous Ground

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A clandestine treaty. A death-bed confession. And the hunt is on for Sean Dillon, who must go head to head with the Mafia.

The year is 1944. Just outside Delhi a British Dakota crashes, taking lives and destroying a clandestine treaty signed by Lord Mountbatten and the Communist leader, Mao Tse-tung. An historic agreement, one set to change the course of history.

Over thirty years later, a death-bed confession from a Mafia kingpin reveals the answers to untouched secrets about the treaty, and just how much the British and Chinese governments would pay for its destruction.

It's not long before Sean Dillon enters the fray; his feared expertise tested as he goes up against the uncompromising violence of the Mafia and the enticing dangers of a beautiful woman, more deadly than any professional killer he has ever known.

Battling ruthless killers and the higher unseen powers of the government, Dillon must expose treacheries, colossal truths, and risk everything he loves in an explosive and thrilling quest for justice.

280 pages, Kindle Edition

First published March 23, 1994

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About the author

Jack Higgins

480 books1,279 followers
There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

Jack Higgins was best known of the many pseudonyms of Henry Patterson. (See also Martin Fallon, Harry Patterson, Hugh Marlowe and James Graham.)

He was the New York Times bestselling author of more than seventy thrillers, including The Eagle Has Landed and The Wolf at the Door. His books have sold more than 250 million copies worldwide.

Born in Newcastle upon Tyne, England, Patterson grew up in Belfast, Northern Ireland. As a child, Patterson was a voracious reader and later credited his passion for reading with fueling his creative drive to be an author. His upbringing in Belfast also exposed him to the political and religious violence that characterized the city at the time. At seven years old, Patterson was caught in gunfire while riding a tram, and later was in a Belfast movie theater when it was bombed. Though he escaped from both attacks unharmed, the turmoil in Northern Ireland would later become a significant influence in his books, many of which prominently feature the Irish Republican Army. After attending grammar school and college in Leeds, England, Patterson joined the British Army and served two years in the Household Cavalry, from 1947 to 1949, stationed along the East German border. He was considered an expert sharpshooter.

Following his military service, Patterson earned a degree in sociology from the London School of Economics, which led to teaching jobs at two English colleges. In 1959, while teaching at James Graham College, Patterson began writing novels, including some under the alias James Graham. As his popularity grew, Patterson left teaching to write full time. With the 1975 publication of the international blockbuster The Eagle Has Landed, which was later made into a movie of the same name starring Michael Caine, Patterson became a regular fixture on bestseller lists. His books draw heavily from history and include prominent figures—such as John Dillinger—and often center around significant events from such conflicts as World War II, the Korean War, and the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Patterson lived in Jersey, in the Channel Islands.

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5 stars
1,435 (31%)
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Displaying 1 - 29 of 128 reviews
Profile Image for Tim.
2,497 reviews329 followers
December 11, 2017
Jack Higgins is a great author and Sean Dillon is an excellent character. 9 of 10 stars
Profile Image for Pierre Tassé (Enjoying Books).
598 reviews93 followers
April 9, 2024
I didn’t enjoy this short story at all. It took me days -weeks-to read it all. I’ll be stopping this series for a long while.
Profile Image for John.
1,458 reviews36 followers
April 24, 2010
I'm not a big Higgins fan, but I thoroughly enjoyed this one. Probably that's because it's a whole lot like reading a James Bond novel (of whom I am a big fan), just more contrived and a lot less literary than anything Ian Fleming ever wrote. Sean Dillon makes for a likable, ruthless hero, and this is the first time readers get to see him portrayed as a good guy. The book is a quick, easy read: it's sparsely detailed and dialog-heavy--as if it were written for people who don't usually like novels. It's a story that features characters and settings from all over the globe, and Higgins does a fantastic job of giving each character a unique dialect, as well as describing the exotic locations with native-like authenticity. Not too many surprises here, but fans of old-fashioned spy stories should be more than satisfied.
Profile Image for Claudia.
38 reviews
May 21, 2015
I'm a fan of Sean Dillon, who's rather a lot like James Bond – if James Bond had a history of working for the IRA and selling his services as a mercenary. He's my kind of anti-hero: a redeemed villain who's smart, competent, ruthless and charming, always a witty remark on his tongue.

Having said that, Higgins' style is very matter-of-fact and sparse even at the best of times, and in the third Dillion novel, the writing seems largely uninspired and occasionally rather sloppy. It doesn't help that the plot takes some outlandish leaps that required more than the usual level of suspension of disbelief. Dillon's miraculous recovery after being almost gutted on a mission didn't seem anymore believable than the strange cat-and-mouse game Ferguson et al played with the villains, all of them pretending they weren't after the same thing.

I know this was the early nineties but damn, the way Chief Inspector Hannah Bernstein is treated both by the men she's working with and the author is appalling! I remember that I used to root for her and Dillon when I read the books as a teenager, but now I just want to slap Dillon for being a condescending jerk - and also slap Hannah for basically swooning over him like a teenage girl. Hard to imagine a decorated Scotland Yard officer would act this way, or allow herself to be sent to fetch tea, even twenty-some years ago.

Not my favourite Dillon novel.
46 reviews
April 15, 2012
On Dangerous Ground was an okay book. It started out well, with good action and such, but then petered out for a while. The middle hundred pages or so don't really feel like they're going anywhere. It finally picks up at the end, and goes out with a fairly exciting finish. The protagonist, Sean Dillon, is an absurd character. He speaks several languages fluently, Is extremely quick with a gun, knows kung-fu, and is an expert diver. Oh, and don't forget that he's also a jazz pianist. And an actor and dancer. But at least he's charming and readable. Higgins keeps the pace brisk, so you don't really care about all the nonsense within the story. The dialogue isn't the best, either. If you're looking for a fun novel, this could be it. But you also might try someone who constructs their prose more skillfully; perhaps Elmore Leonard or Stephen King.
Profile Image for Bonnie.
2,368 reviews8 followers
February 11, 2011
The Sean Dillon series by Jack Higgins is really a lot of fun in audiobook form. I read the first book in the series and it was good, but the reader really adds something so that it's more fun to listen to. Dillon has now joined the "Prime Minister's Secret Army". In this adventure an American with a beautiful stepdaughter and Mafia connections rents an estate on Loch Dugh in Scotland in search of a document. General Ferguson and his crew try to get the document before he can. There are surprises. The violence is not graphically gory and any sex is not described.
6 reviews
September 28, 2009
Despite being written in 1994, the plot and the characterisations are firmly stuck in the 50's with the misogynism of that period in full flow. One of the principal characters, Sean Dillon, would make Dirk Pitt look like a 5 stone weakling. I a glad I borrowed this from a library!

Profile Image for Sylvia .
123 reviews10 followers
June 5, 2009
i JUST LOVE fERGUSON...HE REALLY KNOWS HOW TO HANDLE SEAN.i LEARNT SO MUCH ABOUT U-Boats and the bastard Hitler.really enlightning.higgins is good!
25 reviews
January 15, 2022
A very easy read, kept it interesting, was very predictable.
Profile Image for Michael Martz.
1,139 reviews47 followers
April 1, 2024
"On Dangerous Ground", published in 1994, is a sort of old-school thriller by a master of the old-school thriller genre, Jack Higgins, starring an old-school protagonist of the first order, the inimitable Sean Dillon. It's considered to be one of Higgins' better efforts, but for my taste the old-school shtick is getting a bit, well, old.

On Dangerous Ground is all about the effort by two groups to locate a long lost document that would basically allow Great Britain to maintain control of Hong Kong for another hundred years. It was presumed to be lost forever when the only man who had it in his possession was involved in a plane crash. On one side, the British government has hired the human Swiss Army Knife, Sean Dillon, to try to locate it. The other group searching for the document, a Mafia-aligned family with much to lose if Hong Kong reverts to Chinese control, is fronted by a beautiful couple with impeccable (other than the relationship with the most powerful Mafia don on the planet) credentials. The document is assumed to be somewhere in a castle in Scotland belonging to the man who previously possessed it, but both sides, who have very different plans for what to do with it when found, need to find a way to weasel their way in to the good graces of the current owner of the property to locate it. Through it all, Dillon is able to showcase his multiple skills: language savant, pro-level diver, fist-fighter, crack shot, irresistible lover, stunt driver, yada yada yada....).

On the one hand, it's a good story with a somewhat unexpected conclusion. On the other hand, the style of writing is a bit archaic, the characters too broadly drawn, and the dialogue is chock full of cliches from beginning to end. It's a story with a lot of excitement and an interesting premise, but seems considerably dated to me.
Profile Image for Serdar Poirot.
320 reviews3 followers
January 7, 2024
Lord Mountbatten Çin iç savaşı sırasında Mao ile görüşüp onunla bir anlaşma yapar. Eğer iktidara gelirse Hong Kong'daki İngiliz İdaresi 100 sene daha uzayacaktır. 4 nüsha imzalanan belge alınır ama uçak düşer. Dördüncü nüsha Campbell'ın İncil'ine gizlenmiştir. Yıllar sonra Norah Bell, Michael Ahern ile buluşur. Amerika ve İsrail başkanlarını öldüreceklerdir. Billy içlerindeki ajandır ama Ferguson'u arayınca onu öldürür. Sahte bir patlama ile rahatlamalarını sağlar. Ama Sean Dillon bu numaraya kanmaz ve Hannah Bernstein ile Michael Ahern'i öldürür. Norah da onu ciddi bir şekilde yaralar. Hastaneden çıktığında çok güçsüzdür. Bir Çin lokantasına gider ve oradaki serseriler engeller. Lokantanın sahibi chi gücüne sahiptir ve 4 haftada Sean'ı dövüş sanatı ve egzersizlerle eskisinden iyi yapar. Bir hastanede bu İncil muhabbeti açılır. Carl Morgan adlı Sicilya mafyasına dayanan adam, Çin'deki menfaatleri için bu belgeyi ele geçirmelidir. Üvey kızı Asta ile beraber Campbell'ın akrabasının arazisini kiralar. Ferguson da yanındaki araziyi kiralar. İki taraf da birbirini bilir ama nezaket çerçevesinde çalışır. Sean Asta ile arayı iyi tutar. Fergus Munro, Rory ile görüşür. Carl kızına dokunduğu için Fergus'u öldürür. En sonunda Hannah yardımıyla göldeki uçak enkazından ilgili belgeyi bulur ama Carl onu ve Ferguson'u da alıp kaçar. Sean Sicilya'ya gidecektir. Onları yakalamak için Sean Egan'ın yaptığı gibi paraşütle atlar. Belgeyi kurtarır ama yine vurulur. Asta bundan sonra ne yapacaktır? Başbakan belgeyi ne yapacaktır? Sean ve Hannah arasında ne olacaktır? Keyifle soluksuz okunan bir roman.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Profile Image for Stanley Goldyn.
Author 2 books27 followers
May 22, 2022
From the author of the hugely successful "The Eagle Has Landed" (1975), which sold more than 50 million copies.

Henry "Harry" Patterson, better known by his sobriquet, Jack Higgins, began writing action novels of war and mystery in 1960.
"On Dangerous Ground" was published in 1994. Set in the twilight months of WW2 in the Himalayas and 1993 London, Higgins' hero - Sean Dillon - oozes with Irish frankness and brutality. Higgins' complex plots flow with fast-paced action, and meet in a confluence of realism and believable satisfaction.

His writing style can be described as nothing fancy, yet his pedestrian prose is definitely riveting, typical of the old, classic page-turner. The story takes the reader to Scotland, where Dillon and British Intelligence thrust and parry with Mafia thugs over a missing document signed in 1944 by Chairman Mao Tse-Tung and Lord Louis Mountbatten, who agree to extend Hong Kong as a British protectorate until 1 July 2097, with obvious political and economic ramifications. The novel became the stuff of another film, a 1996 TV movie with Rob Lowe as Dillon.

Higgins died last month, 9 April 2022, aged 92. His 85 published novels captivated readers with thrillers, mystery and espionage for over three decades. I will be reading more of Jack Higgins.
Profile Image for Oli Turner.
528 reviews6 followers
Read
June 4, 2025
The fifty-second #jackhiggins #martinfallon #hughmarlowe #harrypatterson #henrypatterson #jamesgraham novel #ondangerousground published in 1994. The third appearance of #seandillon and another variation on one of Higgins favourite questions: what hidden secrets of ww2 could have political consequences in the 90s. Higgins has dealt with this in a few of his books and he pulls elements from previous novels and puts a fresh twist on them here. Including a reference to Egan who featured in #aseasoninhell and a tactic used in that novel. He also includes the Sicilian mafia which he hasn’t written about for a few novels. I read this one back in the 1990s. I don’t think it’s nostalgia, but it seems like it holds up really well.
Plenty of action and intrigue from the start. Lots of puzzle pieces, Arabs, ex-IRA, an assassination attempt against the american president (and possibly the British PM and leader of Israel), the mafia protecting their business interests in Hong Kong, mystical eastern martial arts that help Dillon recover from career ending injuries, crashed planes, diving, murder, feats of fighting prowess, roaming about the Scottish countryside, shifting alliances, a parachute jump and of course medicinal brandy. Fast paced and politically astute with an exciting and gripping ending. Great stuff.
Profile Image for Sam.
3,460 reviews265 followers
September 26, 2017
I'm not sure about this one. The main story is good with a certain Bondesque style to it (you know, the swarve gentleman hero out to save the world thing) but I found some of the interplay between the characters a little offputting and not completely right for the time. Particularly the relationship between Dillon and Bernstein, I'm sure (at least I would hope) that a Chief Inspector wouldn't allow herself to be treated like some kind of lacky (I know I wouldn't!). That aside, I did also find the general writing to be a little sparse and seemingly aimed at those who want a nice easy read without being overly burdened by details, although I think a few more would've been fine. Not a bad read but not one that is particularly memorable.
Profile Image for Philip.
204 reviews6 followers
May 15, 2019
"On Dangerous Ground" by Jack Higgins is the third in the Sean Dillon series and doesn't disappoint. The story begins in 1944. just outside Delhi a British Dakota crashes, taking lives and destroying a clandestine treaty signed by Lord Mountbatten and the Communist leader, Mao Tse-tung. An historic agreement, one set to change the course of history concerning the proposed handover by the British of Hong Kong in 1997. Sean Dillon enters the fray following ,a death-bed confession from a Mafia kingpin reveals the answers to the secrets about the treaty, which the British and Chinese governments would pay dearly for its destruction. With the backing of the British Government he goes up against the uncompromising violence of the Mafia and of course, the enticing dangers of a beautiful woman, the explosive climax of this book plays out in the wild scenery of the Highlands of Scotland. A great, fast, action-packed read from Jack Higgins, whose roguish but deadly main character Sean Dillion, I'm beginning to like.
Profile Image for Edmond Gagnon.
Author 18 books52 followers
July 5, 2024
I like Jack Higgins writing style and enjoyed this story but have tired of characters like Sean Dillon, the spy or ex-soldier of some type with all the special skills necessary to save the world.
At least this tale is of a different sort, tying in the past with present, while trying to locate a lost artifact that could change the political fate of at least one country, let alone the financial interests of other countries and criminal enterprises as well.
There's enough action to keep readers turning pages, and although I felt they were predictable, a few plot twists make the story more interesting.
Profile Image for NCHS Library.
1,221 reviews23 followers
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July 7, 2022
From Follett
As Hong Kong prepares for Chinese takeover in 1997, powerful forces search for the lost Chungking Covenant that would keep Hong Kong under British rule for another hundred years. England's prime minister learns of a secret document signed by Mao Tse-tung that could delay the Chinese takeover of Hong Kong for an additional 100 years. The British hire former terrorist Sean Dillon to keep the document from coming to light, before parties in Hong Kong retrieve it and destroy the balance of world power.
Profile Image for Jon Christie.
61 reviews
September 3, 2024
Set primarily in Scotland on the Loche Du Castle estate. The description of the highlands makes you want to go there. Couple that with a decent yarn about the discovery of the existence of a document signed by Chiang Kai Chek (sp?) extending the British`s lease of Hong Kong by another 100 years and you've got a very solid read. I've been looking at Higgens' books on my family`s bookshelf for years next to "Coma" and "Jaws" etc. I wish I'd put down the John R. Tunis and Matt Christopher novels sooner.
Profile Image for David Walley.
315 reviews
October 24, 2022
Was this Sean Dillon or was it superman ? I find it hard to tell them apart. This book had an interesting plot but I was amazed at how the hero seemingly was able to do anything. It read rather like a child's adventure story rather than a book written by a man who has certainly written some good books with good plots in the past. The plot was interesting but the hyperbole that is Sean Dillon spoiled it.
6 reviews
May 31, 2024
Not my favourite Jack Higgins book. For one thing you could tell what was coming many pages before it did. It was also rather too slow paced, especially in the middle section of the book where it seemed to go nowhere. Really could have cut out a few parts of the story that would have increased the pace of the story and made it more interesting to read. Quickened up in the closing stages and become rather exciting. But by then it was rather too late to save the story.
Profile Image for Ajitabh Pandey.
857 reviews51 followers
May 1, 2020
A very good portray of characters, languages and places. Perhaps the twist at the end could have been avoided. That added some extra pages to the book and there was not much unique information there. The book is little descriptive with dialogues between characters.
I enjoyed it and will read the next book in the series.
639 reviews
August 25, 2021
Very enjoyable fast read, enjoy the Sean Dillon series. Like books where the bad people get what they deserve. No exceptions here. The team is on the search for a document signed by Mao at the climax ofWWII, a Mafia team is also attempting to get the document for their use and it is up to the team to get it. A real page turner.
Profile Image for Neil Fulwood.
978 reviews23 followers
August 20, 2022
Sean Dillon volume three, in which Jack Higgins basically rewrites Sean Dillon volume two only with a downed Lysander in a loch rather than a sunken u-boat on a tropical coastal shelf. Every other narrative beat and plot development is exactly the same. And for some reason I can’t fathom I’m perfectly happy to give the shameless old hack a free pass.
Profile Image for Marco Antonio.
141 reviews1 follower
June 22, 2025
Una de las tantas novelas de antaño del gran Jack Higgins, un poco de todo, acción, espionaje, algo relacionado con la mafia siciliana y un documento perdido al final de la segunda guerra mundial.
Una buena historia, con buenos personajes de ambos bandos ideal para pasar un buen rato con algo ligero pero tampoco es un libro para el regocijo.
Cumple como la gran mayoría de los títulos de Higgins.
Profile Image for James.
79 reviews3 followers
June 30, 2017
I enjoyed this more than expected. they use the element of old enemies that are friendly which I always think it's cool.
however these books always seem to be 75% of what happens in 10 pages while I feel like a lot of filler. Good though, I'll read another
Profile Image for Pasan Rajadasa.
58 reviews9 followers
December 10, 2017
I remember the first time I read a Sean Dillon novel, around 10 years ago. It was just the same excitement and the trill with this one. There were some plot twists you could see coming, and some parts seem to easy, but a pleasure to read nonetheless.
Profile Image for Randall Lovejoy.
149 reviews4 followers
August 18, 2018
Another great Sean Dillon adventure

Another outstanding novel by Mr. Higgins. I’ve seen so many of his books in stores and airports in the past. It’s a shame I just started reading them recently. The great news is there a lot of them, so lots of reading ahead of me.
Displaying 1 - 29 of 128 reviews

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