Eric Ambler, a British author of thrillers and screenplays, was well-known for The Mask of Dimitrios, which I haven't read but probably will in the foreseeable future. He is not as well known for Send No More Roses, published in the US as The Siege of the Villa Lipp. That's probably because it's not one of his books adapted into a film or miniseries. One line from it is on his Wikiquote page, however: "What use is an honest lawyer when what you need is a dishonest one?" This is eerily similar to that line about Saul Goodman, "You don't want a criminal lawyer... you want a 'criminal' lawyer."
Anyway, Send No More Roses, or whatever you want to call it, is great. The narrator, Paul Firman, is a great rogue. Frits Krom, a man staying in his house with two younger colleagues, is a social scientist who believes Firman is one of the world's great unpunished criminals. Krom is very much an irritating fool, an Ahab who couldn't beat the Whale in a game of checkers. But he's not Firman's biggest problem. No, that would be Mat Williamson, a sometime business partner who finds it convenient to end his association with Firman in a very permanent way. Things get tense, but they never stop being funny. Ambler was 68 when he published it and I think it was his second-to-last. In top form, though.
Final blogger's note: Yes, this post should have gone up last night. I mostly had it written in my head, and only after going to bed did I realize I hadn't set it down on paper. Or whatever.
2 comments:
Your brief review of Eric Ambler's Send No More Roses convinced me to search out his books - not understanding immediately of course that they might be difficult to find after so long a time. I found Cause for Alarm at Russel's today and this evening I've ordered A Coffin for Dimitrios and Send No More Roses (from Thrift) because you made it sound interesting. Getting two of his early books and a later one should be interesting.
Also interesting is the news he was married to Joan Harrison, who wrote or co-wrote many of Alfred Hitchcock's screenplays - in fact Hitchcock organized their wedding.
I also found the following comments on Fantastic Fiction:
He is often credited as the inventor of the modern political thriller and John Le Carré once described him as 'the source on which we all draw.'
and
"Our greatest thriller writer." - Graham Greene
plus, a mention of a book that was made into one of my favorite movies:
Topkapi "Arthur Abdel Simpson . . . is one of fiction's most delightful rogues, and his adventures provide the best Ambler entertainment in years." - Anthony Boucher (wrote some mysteries under the name H.H. Holmes.)
Older books are definitely interesting and well worth discovering or finding again.
Jer found this odd cartoon called Elvis and Jack Mysteries. It's pretty entertaining.
https://youtu.be/ZvZGXrrtRNA?si=eJIIBhkTouHdCvrM
I'm glad to have triggered a mini Eric Ambler renaissance here. I'll be starting on Cause for Alarm myself in the near future. As for Send No More Roses I hope you both wind up enjoying it. The lead character is definitely on the roguish side but I think he's worth following for a couple hundred pages.
Joan Harrison is an interesting figure in Hitchcock's career. She was his screenwriter when he emigrated and became a Hollywood director. And of course she married Ambler, whom Hitchcock admired. Not sure which happened first. Anyway, there is an Alfred Hitchcock Presents based on one of Ambler's stories. As for Harrison, she also wrote Andre de Toth's Dark Waters and a lot of TV stuff in the 50s.
John LeCarré and Graham Greene are high praise indeed. Greene especially was an author who would have been equally formidable no matter what he decided to write about.
I've started reading more old stuff recently. We live in a perversely close-minded time when it comes to literature and a lot of other things. It's good to get outside of it for a while.
The Elvis and Jack cartoon was hilarious. The company, Icebox Entertainment, did a lot of stuff around the turn of the millennium. They have a TV Tropes page. Most of it isn't up to that level of quality, though.
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