![]() ![]() Buchan treads a fine line when talking about the war. It’s a neat trick to write about mortal danger in such a way that men who are living with it on a daily basis don’t chuck your book into No Man’s Land or, more likely, use it as necessary paper. ![]() Nevertheless, it could apply the Greenmantle as well. Granted, his comment was about Buchan’s first thriller, The 39 Steps. All that matters is that once you’ve started, you can’t put the book down.” The viewpoint that fascinates me most is from that line officer at the front. The story is greatly appreciated in the midst of mud and rain and shells, and all that could make trench life depressing.” Finally, this bit of analysis from someone at the London Telegraph: “ understood that in a thriller…what matters above all is to keep the reader focused on what is going to happen next…It doesn’t matter that the reader has no clue where he is being taken or, when he gets there, how the thing happened as it did. One wants something to engross the attention without tiring the mind. “Between Kipling and Fleming,” he said, “stands John Buchan, the father of the modern spy thriller.” A nameless reviewer at Library Journal agrees: “Buchan essentially invented the espionage novel with his Richard Hannay yarns.” And a nameless officer serving on the Western Front offered this endorsement: “It is just the kind of fiction for here. ![]()
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