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Honour #3
All Honourable Men
Libro usado en buenas condiciones, por su antiguedad podria contener señales normales de uso
298 pages, Paperback
First published August 6, 1998
38 people are currently reading
39 people want to read
About the author
Gavin Lyall
69 books31 followersGavin was born and educated in Birmingham. For two years he served as a RAF pilot before going up to Cambridge, where he edited Varsity, the university newspaper. After working for Picture Post, the Sunday Graphic and the BBC, he began his first novel, The Wrong Side of the Sky, published in 1961. After four years as Air Correspondent to the Sunday Times, he resigned to write books full time. He was married to the well-known journalist Katherine Whitehorn and they lived in London with their children.
Lyall won the British Crime Writers' Association's Silver Dagger award in both 1964 and 1965. In 1966-67 he was Chairman of the British Crime Writers Association. He was not a prolific author, attributing his slow pace to obsession with technical accuracy. According to a British newspaper, “he spent many nights in his kitchen at Primrose Hill, north London, experimenting to see if one could, in fact, cast bullets from lead melted in a saucepan, or whether the muzzle flash of a revolver fired across a saucer of petrol really would ignite a fire”.
He eventually published the results of his research in a series of pamphlets for the Crime Writers' Association in the 1970s. Lyall signed a contract in 1964 by the investments group Booker similar to one they had signed with Ian Fleming. In return for a lump payment of £25,000 and an annual salary, they and Lyall subsequently split his royalties, 51-49.
Up to the publication in 1975 of Judas Country, Lyall's work falls into two groups. The aviation thrillers (The Wrong Side Of The Sky, The Most Dangerous Game, Shooting Script, and Judas Country), and what might be called "Euro-thrillers" revolving around international crime in Europe (Midnight Plus One, Venus With Pistol, and Blame The Dead).
All these books were written in the first person, with a sardonic style reminiscent of the "hard-boiled private-eye" genre. Despite the commercial success of his work, Lyall began to feel that he was falling into a predictable pattern, and abandoned both his earlier genres, and the first-person narrative, for his “Harry Maxim" series of espionage thrillers beginning with The Secret Servant published in 1980. This book, originally developed for a proposed BBC TV Series, featured Major Harry Maxim, an SAS officer assigned as a security adviser to 10 Downing Street, and was followed by three sequels with the same central cast of characters.
In the 1990s Lyall changed literary direction once again, and wrote four semi-historical thrillers about the fledgling British secret service in the years leading up to World War I.
Gavin Lyall died of cancer in 2003.
Lyall won the British Crime Writers' Association's Silver Dagger award in both 1964 and 1965. In 1966-67 he was Chairman of the British Crime Writers Association. He was not a prolific author, attributing his slow pace to obsession with technical accuracy. According to a British newspaper, “he spent many nights in his kitchen at Primrose Hill, north London, experimenting to see if one could, in fact, cast bullets from lead melted in a saucepan, or whether the muzzle flash of a revolver fired across a saucer of petrol really would ignite a fire”.
He eventually published the results of his research in a series of pamphlets for the Crime Writers' Association in the 1970s. Lyall signed a contract in 1964 by the investments group Booker similar to one they had signed with Ian Fleming. In return for a lump payment of £25,000 and an annual salary, they and Lyall subsequently split his royalties, 51-49.
Up to the publication in 1975 of Judas Country, Lyall's work falls into two groups. The aviation thrillers (The Wrong Side Of The Sky, The Most Dangerous Game, Shooting Script, and Judas Country), and what might be called "Euro-thrillers" revolving around international crime in Europe (Midnight Plus One, Venus With Pistol, and Blame The Dead).
All these books were written in the first person, with a sardonic style reminiscent of the "hard-boiled private-eye" genre. Despite the commercial success of his work, Lyall began to feel that he was falling into a predictable pattern, and abandoned both his earlier genres, and the first-person narrative, for his “Harry Maxim" series of espionage thrillers beginning with The Secret Servant published in 1980. This book, originally developed for a proposed BBC TV Series, featured Major Harry Maxim, an SAS officer assigned as a security adviser to 10 Downing Street, and was followed by three sequels with the same central cast of characters.
In the 1990s Lyall changed literary direction once again, and wrote four semi-historical thrillers about the fledgling British secret service in the years leading up to World War I.
Gavin Lyall died of cancer in 2003.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
May 19, 2016
Good, solid spy novel, full of interesting international history and intrigue in the months before WWI began--in this case, the focus is on the relationships between England, Turkey, Germany, and France in the waning years of the Ottoman Empire, and the building of the Baghdad Railway). I'm looking forward to reading more books by Gavin Lyall--and I'm going to go back and read the earlier books in this particular series so I can see the build-up of the ongoing character relationships. Good stuff!
December 9, 2014
Wonderfully engrossing tale of skulduggery, and double cross and double-double cross, enlivened by a cast of entertainingly and endearingly drawn characters, which even doesn't end with a desperate artillery duel in the Turkey mountains (or rather counter-battery fire) but in the cloistered environs of Whitehall in the penultimate lines... Rankling is an ace of a character and I look forward to catching his other adventures and also other works of Mr Lyall...
January 19, 2013
Brilliant writing with lots of lovely turns of phrase. A really good read too.
March 14, 2013
As always, a terrific read from Gavin Lyall.
December 2, 2013
Well-written, but not really my cup of tea. 1930-s era British/Arab/Irish/French spy drama
September 30, 2024
Most enjoyable spy and action into the realms of early 20th century geopolitics with the British, notably Capt Matt Ranklin and his sidekick O'Gilroy attempting to halt the German Baghdad Railway progress across Turkey. Good women characters too in Lady Kelso ( great in her 60s) and love interest Mrs Finn. Reminiscent of the on-going conflicts over land, oil etc in the Middle East region. Lyall's prose is sharp, witty and fun to read.
October 5, 2023
A damned good read
If you want your spy novels set just before the first world war or just a good story with plenty of detail and daring do, this must be for you, all this series is excellent.
If you want your spy novels set just before the first world war or just a good story with plenty of detail and daring do, this must be for you, all this series is excellent.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews