High Citadel

Fontana (1990)

Author: Desmond Bagley

First Published: 1965

Pages: 255

After being disappointed with Alistair MacLean's Bear Island, I was slightly reticent to jump immediately into a book in a similar thriller vein by his contemporary, Desmond Bagley. However, it seemed that from everything I read in Facebook groups, comments about Bagley were all positive with examples such as, "never read a bad one" or "always enjoyed his books". I had nothing to worry about surely?

In fact, Desmond Bagley's first novel, The Golden Keel, published in 1963, was the the first book I ever read on an ereader. It was probably free! I remember enjoying it, but the memory is clouded; the experience of reading an eBook for the first time and the wonder of how this new type of device would effect my reading in the future overwhelms any detail of the novel. Bagley died in 1983, roughly twenty years before electronic paper was incorporated first into the Sony Librie. I wonder what he would have thought of ereaders? He took an interest in computer programming during his lifetime, and was an early adopter of personal computing to aid his work as a writer, perhaps he would have embraced it?

Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang

Author: Mike Ripley

First Published: 2017

Pages: 465

Something a bit different for this latest blog. Whilst browsing through Amazon UK I came across this book and instantly knew I would have to get it.

Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang was written by Mike Ripley, author of the award-winning 'Angel' comedy thrillers. Between 1989 and 2008 he was crime fiction critic for the Daily Telegraph newspaper and then the Birmingham Post, reviewing over 950 crime novels. He was also a scriptwriter on the BBC's television series "Lovejoy". Mike is the series editor of the Ostara Crime and Top Notch Thrillers imprints, which is reviving novels that will be of interest to thriller, spy and high adventure fans around the world. He is also responsible for the "Getting Away With Murder" column on www.shotsmag.co.uk. Most recently, Mike completed the Albert Campion novel left unfinished on the death of Pip Carter (husband of British golden age crime author Margery Allingham) "Mr Campion's Farewell" and he has continued the Campion series with a further six original novels.

Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang is a fantastic study of the boom in British thrillers between the 1960s and the end of the 1970s. Between these times British born authors ruled the thriller fiction scene across the world. Ripley examines the background to this phenomena, providing an interesting, fun and informative journey from its roots with such authors as Hammond Inness, Eric Ambler and Ian Fleming.