Post a Comment. Thursday, October 12, High Citadel by Desmond Bagley. Posted by OlmanFeelyus at PM. No comments:. Newer Post Older Post Home.
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His muscles tensed at the thought that they were communists… Chapter 3, II. Desmond Bagley — was a British journalist and author of 16 thrillers, the last two published posthumously. Along with Alistair Maclean b. All three authors published throughout the s and 70s in stylish and distinctive paperbacks by Fontana books at the bargain price of 25p or 30p or even 35p.
Though almost exactly contemporary with MacLean, Bagley started publishing almost a decade later. This is his second novel. At which point it is revealed that one of the older passengers is a well-known politician who has returned to the country with the aim of overthrowing the military dictator, Lopez. Thus begins a narrative in which the 10 or so survivors of the crash must make their way back to civilisation, despite attacks by the communists which turn into a miniature war.
The actual hijacking is over very quickly. The plane has crashed at a landing strip for abandoned mine workings and the survivors set off the next day to walk down the track to civilisation. However, as they turn a corner leading to the only bridge over a deep river they are fired on by armed forces on the other side.
It is the communists, the old rope bridge has partly given way as one of their lorries crossed it on the way up to rendezvous with the plane to capture and kill Aguillar, and they are busy repairing it.
This leads to the heart of the book which is a stand-off: communist guerillas on one side of the gorge with jeeps and lorries and lots of guns; our motley crew of survivors on the other with just one gun but — in an unexpected development — an academic who turns out to be a specialist in medieval weapons and shows our guys how to make lethal crossbows and a working trebuchet using tools in the workshop of the abandoned mining camp.
Our chaps hold off the guerillas by preventing them repairing the bridge, while the toughest men — Rohde and Forester — set off to cross a high pass in the Andes to the other side and contact troops who hopefully have been suborned to support the democrat politician. Willis was glad to get away from the certainty of a hand-to-hand fight, defenceless against the ruthless armed men who were coming to butcher them.
Ch 8, V. They might as well be orcs or followers of Lord Voldemort. It is a binary worldview in which they are simply pure malevolence.
After the non-stop hysteria of MacLean, the style is commendably sane and sober as the lead characters formulate and discuss plans in a calm rational manner. The calm and sane style makes the natural forces which get involved — a blizzard which attacks the men as they are crossing the high pass, and the accompanying fog lower in the valley — all the more believable.
Forester felt warm and at ease, and to him the two were synonymous. Strange that the snow was so warm and soft, he thought; and opened his eyes to see a glar eof white before him.
He sighed and closed his eyes again, feeling a sense of disappointment. It snow after all. He supposed he should make an effort to move and get out of this deliciously warm snow or he would die, but he decided it was not worht the effort. He just let the warmth lap him in comfort and for a second before he relapsed into unconsciousness he wondered vaguely where Rohde had got to.
Ch 9, I. If anything, the style and the mentality is a little too cerebral. All the passengers accept the hijack, the crash-landing in which some passengers are horribly crushed, the forced march down the mountainside then attack by the communists, then a prolonged state of siege and being called on to fire crossbows to kill their opponents or blow up their vehicles pretty calmly.
Apart from the drunk Peabody who soon gets his comeuppance, all the men are calm, focused and practical. Tough guy opens his heart; pretty heroine falls for him with a Victorian simple-mindedness.
She felt an almost physical swelling pain in her bosom, a surge of wild, unreasonable happiness, and she knew that she had been wrong when she had felt that Tim was not for her. This was the man with whom she would share her life — for as long as her life lasted. Ch 6, IV. The book appeals to boys and men interested in the mechanics of survival but it is genre fiction because it pays almost no attention to realistic psychology, to the likely consequences of even one of this sequence of quite drastic events on the average person it claims to depict, and converts the potentially interesting cast into pawns in a simplistic battle between Good and Evil.
He felt a growing rage within him at the unfairness of things; just when he had found life again he must leave it — and what a way to leave; cooped up in a cold, dank tunnel at the mercy of human wolves. Ch 10, II. And then in the last 50 pages, all attempts at realism are dropped as the story goes pyrotechnic in a manner worthy of the new and fashionable James Bond films, with the enemy airfield blown up, Forester heroically piloting a stolen jet fighter against the comunist forces, all the baddies shot up and the gallant survivors driving a battered bullet-flecked truck down the hill to freedom.
To top off the sense of adolescent absurdity, Dr Armstrong the academic, quotes the famous Band of brothers speech from Henry V. Now he returns to the small town in British Columbia where it happened to uncover long-buried crimes and contemporary skulduggery. You are commenting using your WordPress. You are commenting using your Google account. You are commenting using your Twitter account. You are commenting using your Facebook account. Notify me of new comments via email. Notify me of new posts via email.
This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed. Follow Books and Boots. His muscles tensed at the thought that they were communists… Chapter 3, II Desmond Bagley — was a British journalist and author of 16 thrillers, the last two published posthumously.
High Citadel This is his second novel. Ch 8, V They might as well be orcs or followers of Lord Voldemort. Style After the non-stop hysteria of MacLean, the style is commendably sane and sober as the lead characters formulate and discuss plans in a calm rational manner.
Ch 9, I If anything, the style and the mentality is a little too cerebral. Ch 6, IV Conclusion The book appeals to boys and men interested in the mechanics of survival but it is genre fiction because it pays almost no attention to realistic psychology, to the likely consequences of even one of this sequence of quite drastic events on the average person it claims to depict, and converts the potentially interesting cast into pawns in a simplistic battle between Good and Evil.
Ch 10, II And then in the last 50 pages, all attempts at realism are dropped as the story goes pyrotechnic in a manner worthy of the new and fashionable James Bond films, with the enemy airfield blown up, Forester heroically piloting a stolen jet fighter against the comunist forces, all the baddies shot up and the gallant survivors driving a battered bullet-flecked truck down the hill to freedom.
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High Citadel by Desmond Bagley (1965)
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High Citadel
His muscles tensed at the thought that they were communists… Chapter 3, II. Desmond Bagley — was a British journalist and author of 16 thrillers, the last two published posthumously. Along with Alistair Maclean b. All three authors published throughout the s and 70s in stylish and distinctive paperbacks by Fontana books at the bargain price of 25p or 30p or even 35p. Though almost exactly contemporary with MacLean, Bagley started publishing almost a decade later. This is his second novel. At which point it is revealed that one of the older passengers is a well-known politician who has returned to the country with the aim of overthrowing the military dictator, Lopez.
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High Citadel / Landslide
High Citadel his second novel cannot fail to secure him a pre-eminent place among contemporary writers of adventure. The setting of High Citadel is the towering peaks of the Andes. A non-scheduled passenger plane is hi-jacked in mid-air and forced down among the forbidding mountains. The surviving passengers, stranded at 16, feet, embark on a perilous descent, only to find that they are trapped by a formidably armed and equipped Communist force, whose target is one particular V. But it soon becomes evident that the enemy is intent on wiping out the lot, and for the ex-R. The party also includes an expert in medieval warfare and a New England schoolmistress, two widely contrasting American businessmen, and a physicist with a fortunate practical bent.