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Message from Malaga
Ian Ferrier was on vacation. For him Spain meant dancing girls, guitars, lazy days in the sun and a reunion with an old friend. It all looked so innocent, but it wasn't. A roller-coaster of an adventure thriller.
367 pages, Mass Market Paperback
Published September 12, 1986
49 people are currently reading
270 people want to read
About the author
Helen MacInnes
67 books258 followersHelen MacInnes was a Scottish-American author of espionage novels. She graduated from the University of Glasgow in Scotland in 1928 with a degree in French and German. A librarian, she married Professor Gilbert Highet in 1932 and moved with her husband to New York in 1937 so he could teach classics at Columbia University. She wrote her first novel, Above Suspicion, in 1939. She wrote many bestselling suspense novels and became an American citizen in 1951.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 51 reviews
June 5, 2018
Nostalgia fix. MacInnes's perspective on gender has not worn particularly well, and the cold war is o-v-e-r, but still an enjoyable reread from my far distant past. My dad was a fan, so I read all of these books as a teen.
Book 100 for 2014!
Book 100 for 2014!
January 9, 2023
An excellent cold war espionage tale of refugees and traitors. The ending was sad, but appropriate for the type of story it was. MacInnes was a master for over forty years. Recommended.
May 30, 2021
Okay I love MacInnes but this was a whole ‘nother level of awesome, like on par with favorites such as Above Suspicion and Decision at Delphi (nothing is on par with Assignment in Brittany), and I can’t figure out how to say how awesome it was and IT’S KILLING ME, SMALLS.
But, just know that my sister came into my room when I was at about the seven-eighths mark, and I was like, “THIS BOOK!!!” and she laughed tolerantly and was like, “Is it stupid?” And I was like, “No, I’m SO WORRIED,” and then she laughed tolerantly again and I went back to clutching the roots of my hair in a vain attempt to manage the suspense.
But, just know that my sister came into my room when I was at about the seven-eighths mark, and I was like, “THIS BOOK!!!” and she laughed tolerantly and was like, “Is it stupid?” And I was like, “No, I’m SO WORRIED,” and then she laughed tolerantly again and I went back to clutching the roots of my hair in a vain attempt to manage the suspense.
August 16, 2019
I have read quite a few MacInnes spy thrillers in my younger years and found them quite exciting and entertaining, they always felt more real than the 007 adventures which I still enjoy today.
I was not sure if I read this book before anyhow it was quite a complicated and messy story that never really took of for me, even if the landscapes and life in Spain really gets highlighted. Which is perhaps the saving grace of the story but the backbone of this spy story never really tickled my fancy.
I was not sure if I read this book before anyhow it was quite a complicated and messy story that never really took of for me, even if the landscapes and life in Spain really gets highlighted. Which is perhaps the saving grace of the story but the backbone of this spy story never really tickled my fancy.
July 29, 2014
This is my only taste of Helen MacInnes, the so-called "Queen of the Spy Writers" so far, but it was written in 1971, thirty years after her debut novel. perhaps, then, she had already peaked out at some point before this, and was no longer at the top of her game. I say this because while the writing was confident and fairly strong, this was for me a deeply flawed and frustrating book that just sort of danced around several issues without really having anything to say about any of them, and then just petered out with a metaphorical shrug. It didn't help my experience that I was reading the 2012 reprint from Titan Books, which turns out to be completely contaminated with misprints of all sorts, with missing punctuation and even words being the norm. Such little care and attention is most saddening.
I wanted to finish the book because the situation was somewhat intriguing, and I did like Ian Ferrier, the civilian protagonist who's basically pressganged by his dying friend into this world of sabotage, defection and counterintelligence. Ferrier's a cool customer who thinks quickly and always seems to know just what to say, but the text lets us know too that he's really a "regular guy", just one who has strong intuition and knows how to handle himself in a fight if he has to. At first I scoffed at the idea that the US intelligence community would be so willing to take up with an outsider, but I thought about it some, and they are after all operating far away from home turf, and "you work with what you can get" seems the motto of the day.
Alas, what really cripples this novel, I think, is a serious lack of perspective. The book isn't exactly short, but it all seems to take place over a period of one or two days. There are scenes that go on, and on, with nothing but back and forth over what should be done, what the other guys might or might not do. There are revelations that seem like they should pack a punch, but end up rather meaningless because we just don't have a wide enough perspective to make them hit with any impact. Characters just seem to fade away when their "job"/scenes are over, and while that may be in many ways true to real life, it's not very satisfying in a novel about almost-defectors, spies and double-dealing. One of the ringleaders of the communist conspiracy in Spain shows up for one scene early on, chats with our protagonist for a bit, and then basically disappears for the rest of the narrative (and keep in mind that in his one brief "speaking" scene, we don't even know he's a ringleader yet). another one turns out to have been The author seems more interested in protracted scenes of melodramatic Spanish women stamping their feet and wringing their hands, and that's just too bad. I would have preferred to spend some time in the heads of the other characters; to learn what they were up to and what they were thinking, rather than hearing about it in code and second-hand. In a book where poison pens, camera lighters and telltale silver pencils are the norm, and where Macinnes even seems to subtly be aware of the absurdity of the whole thing, this would have really helped to bring the text to life. The strange thing is that early on she shows promise of doing just this, showing us three newly trained American KGB agents leaving a flamenco bar and planning the next phase of their mission. But....one of them is then murdered for some reason, and the others never appear again, and that's pretty much all we get of that. There's very little passion behind this, very little discussion of ideology, or any notions of why people (either to the right or left) are doing what they are doing. They're just going through the motions.
I hasten to add that I kind of enjoyed the style of the book, and you might, too. It's comfortably old-school, assertive and brisk, at least when it's not mired in tedeous dialogues. It comes from a time when, at least in fiction, a cigarette and a strong scotch was the solution to most stress-related issues. I like that, you know, even as a non-smoker. Ferrier has got a good sense of irony about him and expresses it in biting sarcasm more than once, which I also liked.
Ultimately though, this book could have been about one or more really deep and pressing issues. it could have been about a defecter travelling abroad to report on his former colleagues, only so he could plan a rise to a better position of power in his home country later. It could have been about the need to avenge a murdered friend. it could have been about a woman operating alone and in the proverbial dark, surrounded by enemies and with nowhere to turn. It could have been about a beautiful Spanish diva and the secrets of her family's past. All these things suggest intriguing possibilities. But the book is really about none of them. It skirts delicately around things without putting much substance into any of them. A real shame.
I wanted to finish the book because the situation was somewhat intriguing, and I did like Ian Ferrier, the civilian protagonist who's basically pressganged by his dying friend into this world of sabotage, defection and counterintelligence. Ferrier's a cool customer who thinks quickly and always seems to know just what to say, but the text lets us know too that he's really a "regular guy", just one who has strong intuition and knows how to handle himself in a fight if he has to. At first I scoffed at the idea that the US intelligence community would be so willing to take up with an outsider, but I thought about it some, and they are after all operating far away from home turf, and "you work with what you can get" seems the motto of the day.
Alas, what really cripples this novel, I think, is a serious lack of perspective. The book isn't exactly short, but it all seems to take place over a period of one or two days. There are scenes that go on, and on, with nothing but back and forth over what should be done, what the other guys might or might not do. There are revelations that seem like they should pack a punch, but end up rather meaningless because we just don't have a wide enough perspective to make them hit with any impact. Characters just seem to fade away when their "job"/scenes are over, and while that may be in many ways true to real life, it's not very satisfying in a novel about almost-defectors, spies and double-dealing. One of the ringleaders of the communist conspiracy in Spain shows up for one scene early on, chats with our protagonist for a bit, and then basically disappears for the rest of the narrative (and keep in mind that in his one brief "speaking" scene, we don't even know he's a ringleader yet). another one turns out to have been The author seems more interested in protracted scenes of melodramatic Spanish women stamping their feet and wringing their hands, and that's just too bad. I would have preferred to spend some time in the heads of the other characters; to learn what they were up to and what they were thinking, rather than hearing about it in code and second-hand. In a book where poison pens, camera lighters and telltale silver pencils are the norm, and where Macinnes even seems to subtly be aware of the absurdity of the whole thing, this would have really helped to bring the text to life. The strange thing is that early on she shows promise of doing just this, showing us three newly trained American KGB agents leaving a flamenco bar and planning the next phase of their mission. But....one of them is then murdered for some reason, and the others never appear again, and that's pretty much all we get of that. There's very little passion behind this, very little discussion of ideology, or any notions of why people (either to the right or left) are doing what they are doing. They're just going through the motions.
I hasten to add that I kind of enjoyed the style of the book, and you might, too. It's comfortably old-school, assertive and brisk, at least when it's not mired in tedeous dialogues. It comes from a time when, at least in fiction, a cigarette and a strong scotch was the solution to most stress-related issues. I like that, you know, even as a non-smoker. Ferrier has got a good sense of irony about him and expresses it in biting sarcasm more than once, which I also liked.
Ultimately though, this book could have been about one or more really deep and pressing issues. it could have been about a defecter travelling abroad to report on his former colleagues, only so he could plan a rise to a better position of power in his home country later. It could have been about the need to avenge a murdered friend. it could have been about a woman operating alone and in the proverbial dark, surrounded by enemies and with nowhere to turn. It could have been about a beautiful Spanish diva and the secrets of her family's past. All these things suggest intriguing possibilities. But the book is really about none of them. It skirts delicately around things without putting much substance into any of them. A real shame.
May 19, 2014
Helen MacInnes is a classic example of the old-school spy thriller. She's written some excellent books, and Message from Malaga is another good story from her canon. MacInnes writes with a great deal of authority in terms of culture and society, probably due to the excellent education she had (degrees in French, German, and library science) as well as the fact that her husband, a classics professor, was also an MI6 operative.
Message from Malaga is a Cold War story, set in Spain during the 60s, and based around a plot of American and KGB spies maneuvering around each other in the traffic of political refugees. Largely a character study, combined with political and social commentary, the story reads more slowly than the typical modern spy thriller. However, despite that, MacInnes compares much more favorably with today's thriller writers (and I am a fan of writers such as Daniel Silva), in that she actually has the wit and skill to weave fairly profound commentary into her storylines without coming across as a cranky academic. She also builds her characters with a careful eye for dialogue and depth.
One rather alarming and fascinating aspect of Message from Malaga is MacInnes' discussion of the social breakdown of the West. Her thoughts on this are depressingly prescient in terms of what is happening today, particularly the willingness to trade away liberty and freedom for comfort which, in turn, ushers in a bigger and more intrusive government.
If you like fairly cerebral spy thrillers, you'd do well to investigate MacInnes' books. I've always enjoyed them, other than several of her more straight romances, such as Friends and Lovers.
Message from Malaga is a Cold War story, set in Spain during the 60s, and based around a plot of American and KGB spies maneuvering around each other in the traffic of political refugees. Largely a character study, combined with political and social commentary, the story reads more slowly than the typical modern spy thriller. However, despite that, MacInnes compares much more favorably with today's thriller writers (and I am a fan of writers such as Daniel Silva), in that she actually has the wit and skill to weave fairly profound commentary into her storylines without coming across as a cranky academic. She also builds her characters with a careful eye for dialogue and depth.
One rather alarming and fascinating aspect of Message from Malaga is MacInnes' discussion of the social breakdown of the West. Her thoughts on this are depressingly prescient in terms of what is happening today, particularly the willingness to trade away liberty and freedom for comfort which, in turn, ushers in a bigger and more intrusive government.
If you like fairly cerebral spy thrillers, you'd do well to investigate MacInnes' books. I've always enjoyed them, other than several of her more straight romances, such as Friends and Lovers.
October 14, 2010
Cleverly crafted political thriller capturing culture and history of Spain. MacInnes is a cerebral writer, which is a welcome change.
August 18, 2017
Not that bad a book, I guess, but I gave up three-quarters of the way through, which is very rare for me, so it is at best below average and perhaps worse than that.
There is nostalgia for today's reader in revisiting the cold war and the chess moves of spy vs. spy. The plot is careful and intricate, and there are a lot of surprises, but they are small scale and you can usually guess where things are going to go. If you want to revisit espionage novels of this period, Eric Ambler and Charles McCarry are much, much better.
And there is so much wrong with this book. It is way too long. The dialogue is wooden and the characterizations are flat and predictable. Everyone who is not elderly is gorgeous. The prose is too often florid ("her dark eyes were smoldering, ready to burst into fire," for example).
And it is sexist in a way which makes its female authorship astonishing. Here are a few examples:
(1) "She was a perfect 36-24-36;" (2) "He watched the neat swing of her hips."; (3) "Have you ever wondered why there are no famous women historians? Too emotional."; (4) "She was the most attractive piece I've seen in years."
Reading time is precious, and one can do a lot better that this book.
There is nostalgia for today's reader in revisiting the cold war and the chess moves of spy vs. spy. The plot is careful and intricate, and there are a lot of surprises, but they are small scale and you can usually guess where things are going to go. If you want to revisit espionage novels of this period, Eric Ambler and Charles McCarry are much, much better.
And there is so much wrong with this book. It is way too long. The dialogue is wooden and the characterizations are flat and predictable. Everyone who is not elderly is gorgeous. The prose is too often florid ("her dark eyes were smoldering, ready to burst into fire," for example).
And it is sexist in a way which makes its female authorship astonishing. Here are a few examples:
(1) "She was a perfect 36-24-36;" (2) "He watched the neat swing of her hips."; (3) "Have you ever wondered why there are no famous women historians? Too emotional."; (4) "She was the most attractive piece I've seen in years."
Reading time is precious, and one can do a lot better that this book.
August 28, 2017
My grouse with MacInnes is the extremely slow pace of all her books, and this is, perhaps, one of the slowest. Nothing seems to happen for the first one hundred pages or so, except the exotic Spanish backdrop. Even when the story finally picks up, it doesn’t become a ‘can’t put it down’ till nearly the last fifty pages. I had expected much more from the famous “Message From Malaga”. Ian Ferrier, now with the US Space Agency, looks up an old wartime friend Jeff Reid while vacationing in Spain. Jeff’s warm welcome to his home and the delights of authentic Flamenco at El Fenicio, soon draws Ian into a complex web of intrigue, the smuggling of refuges from Cuba into Spain, and danger from both the Spanish Police and the KGB, which seems to have eyes and willing hands everywhere. In the midst of all this mayhem stand the stunning but arrogant Flamenco dancer Tavita, and the ingenuous American brunette Amanda, intriguing villas built into the hillsides of Granada, secret passages, loads of local colour, and violence in plenty. I much preferred ‘Above Suspicion’.
March 5, 2012
It was a very suspenseful book; a good read! It is dated by the era in which it was written, but captures the tensions of that time. There is a flavor of Spain in the setting, with descriptions of flamenco dancing and buildings. It is full of spies and counter-spies. It has been quite some years since I'd read any of Helen MacInnes' books, but I remember that others were good as well. Some were made into movies, but I don't think that this one was. Too bad!
July 7, 2017
A strong start and a strong finish, though I got a little lost in the middle with the introduction of a large number of characters. I also wanted to know more about the previous careers of Ian and his friend Jeff, because it's hinted that they were pretty interesting. Great sense of place and atmosphere.
June 17, 2012
I absolutely love Helen MacInnes's novels of espionage and suspense - there's also action and sometimes romance. This was situated in Spain and related to important refugees escaping from Cuba. Great characters and good mystery.
August 29, 2011
Was an interesting spy book. Fun to read!
August 20, 2012
A little more of thriller than I usually read, HM writes solid, detailed mysteries with a good sense of place.
September 4, 2013
Like McInnes way of mixing spy stories and interesting settings
March 21, 2020
Starts with a marvellously descriptive chapter set in a flamenco club, then progressively disappoints: characters appear and disappear; so many bad guys run around in so many directions that it's hard to keep track of them; a revelation about one bad guy is telegraphed, although another is a surprise; a woman CIA agent in her late 20s uses "girl" to refer to herself and other women; one side of the fevered U.S. politics of the early 1970s is forced clumsily into several rounds of dialogue; one of those exchanges involves the woman CIA agent who astonishingly explains her life background and her current job to the hero even though she has met him only minutes before, et cetera. The cover says it was seven months on the NYT best-seller list. Those times must have been stranger than I remember. Maybe if the first chapter hadn't been so good the ultimate disappointment would have been less.
August 8, 2013
The book was written in 1972. The American fear of communism and the authors general perspective on woman jumps out at me the most.
The Americans are wary of the KGB and Cuba and with good reason. The enemy is everywhere and oozes out of every nook and cranny. Even your (spoiled rotten) kid is a dirty red commie! Still, the true American gentleman will sacrifice to maintain freedom for all. That includes visiting the spoiled kid who accidentally aided the commies in killing his dad during one of his rich temper tantrums.
Amanda Ames is a spy who describes her "women's work" which includes tasks like refilling the alcohol, emptying ashtrays, and making chitchat with non-political guests. Tavita dances flamenco professionally and is a torrent of hot and cold. Both main female characters are sexy, tantalizing, emotional, and unpredictable.
The Americans are wary of the KGB and Cuba and with good reason. The enemy is everywhere and oozes out of every nook and cranny. Even your (spoiled rotten) kid is a dirty red commie! Still, the true American gentleman will sacrifice to maintain freedom for all. That includes visiting the spoiled kid who accidentally aided the commies in killing his dad during one of his rich temper tantrums.
Amanda Ames is a spy who describes her "women's work" which includes tasks like refilling the alcohol, emptying ashtrays, and making chitchat with non-political guests. Tavita dances flamenco professionally and is a torrent of hot and cold. Both main female characters are sexy, tantalizing, emotional, and unpredictable.
January 29, 2017
Many years ago, I read all Helen MacInnes' suspense-filled spy thrillers and, in returning to her now, was not disappointed with her skill. Suspense is rarely so well executed. The Cold War scenario of 4o years ago offers a sociological history lesson as to how people felt about the tensions between Russia, China vs the United States. Picture James Bond in "From Russia With Love." Nevertheless, the covert operations are believable, and one suspects that they continue much the same today with the added drama of a new nuclear threat, kindness of the new President.
May 20, 2021
One of the things that I love about Helen MacInnes' spy novels is the setting, no matter where her novels are set, I feel as though I am right there with the characters. In this book, there are two cities, Malaga and Granada.
March 13, 2009
This book is very well written, but Helen MacInnis always seems to kill off the female lead.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Read
May 1, 2009Fiction,spy fiction
May 8, 2009
I had a hard time following all the subplots and characters. Maybe a book to reread to see if my maturity will help me understand this book.
October 8, 2009
This mystery was recommended by a neighbor. I read it to "be polite" and probably won't read any more of her's unless I am on a desert island with no other books to read...
Read
February 27, 2010New author for me - really enjoyed
November 25, 2013
I picked this up a yard sale (I think) ages ago because it takes place in Spain. I did love the setting and the story line twists were fairly intriguing, but overall the book was only OK.
May 12, 2016
I had a hard time getting into this one until closer to the end. Then the tempo picked up. Didn't like this one as well as others I have read by this author.
December 21, 2017
This spy novel is a pretty good vacation read, but I docked it a star because of the annoying treatment of the Spanish flamenco dancer as a stereotype.
August 30, 2019
I picked this book up at a library sale. I'm not sure what on the dust jacket flap caught my attention, but it was enough.
This is the first book I've read by this author, so I had no preconceived expectations. The story moved at a reasonable pace. I'm still trying to decide if there was too much detail given in descriptions, but I don't think so. The descriptions were to be sure the reader felt fully enveloped in Spain, in all its distinctives, past and present (at least the present of 1971 when this was written).
The plot is laid out on the dust jacket, an unexpected murder that puts the protagonist, Ian Ferrier both in the middle and in danger. Wonderfully absent are the details surrounding this plot, and MacInnes does a very good job at weaving complexities into the story that keep the reader guessing as to who is innocent and who is guilty, and of what.
The suspense builds steadily, yet with appropriate crisis points as the story heads toward climax. And the resolution is neither too fast nor too tidy. While loose ends are wrapped up, they are done realistically and easily leaving one's mind free to speculate as to the future lives of the characters.
The characters are developed well, with enough opportunity to develop empathy for many of them. While the story twists and turns, there's enough information given to the reader to follow leads and hunches to their conclusions or dismissals. In short, the reader can solve the crime along with the characters and yet at the same time -- with only one exception -- the clarity of who's on the right side and who's not is craftily hidden until the climax.
Another intriguing device Helen MacInnes uses successfully is to change point of view frequently in the story from one significant character to the next. I've read such is difficult to do well, but it seemed to be well woven and well done in this case.
If you're interested in a story of intrigue with only minor cursing and no gratuitous sex or violence, as this to your list. Twenty-five chapters covering 373 pages will both entertain and at times provoke thoughts of true value and consideration about the value of ideals and what's worth living, and dying for.
This is the first book I've read by this author, so I had no preconceived expectations. The story moved at a reasonable pace. I'm still trying to decide if there was too much detail given in descriptions, but I don't think so. The descriptions were to be sure the reader felt fully enveloped in Spain, in all its distinctives, past and present (at least the present of 1971 when this was written).
The plot is laid out on the dust jacket, an unexpected murder that puts the protagonist, Ian Ferrier both in the middle and in danger. Wonderfully absent are the details surrounding this plot, and MacInnes does a very good job at weaving complexities into the story that keep the reader guessing as to who is innocent and who is guilty, and of what.
The suspense builds steadily, yet with appropriate crisis points as the story heads toward climax. And the resolution is neither too fast nor too tidy. While loose ends are wrapped up, they are done realistically and easily leaving one's mind free to speculate as to the future lives of the characters.
The characters are developed well, with enough opportunity to develop empathy for many of them. While the story twists and turns, there's enough information given to the reader to follow leads and hunches to their conclusions or dismissals. In short, the reader can solve the crime along with the characters and yet at the same time -- with only one exception -- the clarity of who's on the right side and who's not is craftily hidden until the climax.
Another intriguing device Helen MacInnes uses successfully is to change point of view frequently in the story from one significant character to the next. I've read such is difficult to do well, but it seemed to be well woven and well done in this case.
If you're interested in a story of intrigue with only minor cursing and no gratuitous sex or violence, as this to your list. Twenty-five chapters covering 373 pages will both entertain and at times provoke thoughts of true value and consideration about the value of ideals and what's worth living, and dying for.
July 24, 2025
So good was reading MacInnes's The Salzburg Connection that I jumped straight into Message from Malaga and zipped through it in a couple of days. First, it was a good change of pace to see her alter her setting from France/Central Europe/Italy to Spain. The atmosphere changed, going from the bleak, grey mists of Switzerland/Austria to the sunlit towns and cities of Spain, then still under Franco's rule and the echoes of the Spanish Civil War continuing to haunt its veterans and new visitors. Among those newly arrived is Ian Ferrier, a Nasa analyst who meets up with an old friend, Jeff Reid. Turns out that Reid is CIA and involved with a Spanish woman running an escape route from Castro's Cuba into Spain and beyond. Suddenly throwing a wrench into things, however, is Tomas, a former Cuban assassin who has fallen out with Castro. The CIA wants to give him asylum, get information from him, while the Communists want to shut him up. It all makes for an intricate web of spycraft in the early 1970s. By this time, of course, MacInnes has started to incorporate gizmos and what have you into her stories. But they're not too bad. I enjoy espionage thrillers that don't center around technology. And MacInnes has only allowed some watch radio transmitters and the like, along with some miniaturized recording devices. None of that intrudes on the action of the story or the characters.
There was one longish chapter that did almost cause a problem. Where Ferrier takes Amanda Ames (is she CIA or KGB?) to meet up with Communist agent Gene Lucas, the dialog goes on forever. And it consists of Amanda explaining how the youth of the world are being corrupted and made into passive revolutionaries just in time for the Soviets to cause the US government to topple on its bicentennial in 1976. It sounds like an op-ed column. I get that MacInnes was worried. It's 1970, Vietnam war protests, Kent State, Weather Underground, and the like. But don't let your novel sink into propaganda. She almost did that for a few pages. Thankfully, the remainder of the way was more true to form.
There was one longish chapter that did almost cause a problem. Where Ferrier takes Amanda Ames (is she CIA or KGB?) to meet up with Communist agent Gene Lucas, the dialog goes on forever. And it consists of Amanda explaining how the youth of the world are being corrupted and made into passive revolutionaries just in time for the Soviets to cause the US government to topple on its bicentennial in 1976. It sounds like an op-ed column. I get that MacInnes was worried. It's 1970, Vietnam war protests, Kent State, Weather Underground, and the like. But don't let your novel sink into propaganda. She almost did that for a few pages. Thankfully, the remainder of the way was more true to form.
April 21, 2022
Originally published in 1971, this espionage novel is indeed a "good read." Set in Malaga and Granada on the Costa del Sol, it involves a flamenco dancer (the fiery Tavita), a retired bullfighter (the brooding Esteban) and two American expatriates with connections to the U.S. intelligence service. They work together to help refugees from Castro's Cuba escape to freedom. A high-ranking defector with KGB connections shows up and arrogantly insists on receiving special treatment, endangering everyone.
I gave this one three stars because the dialogue is a bit unnatural at times (the main complaint of The New York Times' reviewer back in 1971). But the descriptions of the exotic setting and brisk pacing of the plot more than compensate for that. I'll definitely read more of MacInnes' work.
I gave this one three stars because the dialogue is a bit unnatural at times (the main complaint of The New York Times' reviewer back in 1971). But the descriptions of the exotic setting and brisk pacing of the plot more than compensate for that. I'll definitely read more of MacInnes' work.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 51 reviews