February 8, 2016
In 1946, archeology research fellow Duncan Forrester, the hero of Hollywood screenwriter Scott’s overstuffed fiction debut, wants to return to the Greek island of Crete to retrieve a wartime discovery of “his own personal Rosetta stone.” Meanwhile, David Lyall, Forrester’s Oxford University colleague, is murdered on a wintry night, and Forrester’s best friend, Gordon Clark, is accused of the crime. Clark has a motive, since his wife was having an affair with Lyall. Forrester assumes the amateur sleuth mantle to clear his friend’s name. In addition to the murder and an Indiana Jones–like plot involving the historically important Cretan stone, there’s the discovery of an Old Norse manuscript with Nazi implications and an unbreakable code. Real-life characters, including J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, George Orwell, Ian Fleming, and even a young Margaret Roberts (future Conservative prime minister Margaret Thatcher), lend verisimilitude, but workmanlike prose may leave some readers less than keen on Forrester’s future adventures.
February 15, 2016
Screenwriter Scott's debut novel welcomes an Oxford don home from World War II with the spectacle of a colleague disliked by him and everyone else dead beneath his best friend's lodgings. You'd think you couldn't get much further from the ravages of war than Barnard College at Oxford, where Duncan Forrester has returned in 1946 as junior research fellow in archaeology. But some things haven't changed, like Forrester's infatuation with Margaret Clark, the beautiful librarian married to his old friend Gordon. Enmities can run equally deep even when they're not fueled by national divisions, as Forrester realizes when Gordon tells him that Margaret's taken up with shallow, ambitious David Lyall, who holds the Priestley Latin Fellowship. And despite the smaller scale, the college proves home to its own violent outburst when David is found stabbed to death beneath Gordon's window, through which he seems to have been ejected with force. DI Alec Barber, of the Oxford Constabulary, wastes no time arresting Gordon, and Forrester, his logical counterarguments having no more effect than his emotional testimonials on behalf of his friend, realizes that the only way he can save Gordon is to prove who really did kill his rival. The trail of clues leads surprisingly from Barnard to Germany and Norway, where Forrester seeks the truth of David's wartime service as a commando who was betrayed to the Nazis and more information about his claims to have discovered a unique Old Norse manuscript. These trips provide more scenery and romance than enlightenment; it's not till Forrester is back in Oxford that a casual observation directs him to the truth. The culprit is forgettable; the murder method, ingenious but wildly implausible; and the parade of real-life cameos, from J.R.R. Tolkien to Ian Fleming, increasingly tiresome. Even so, Forrester is excellent company, and fans will surely want to read his further adventures.
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Starred review from March 1, 2016
Returning to Oxford University in 1946 as a junior research fellow in archaeology, ex-Special Operations agent Duncan Forrester is listening to the recitation of Icelandic sagas in the Master's Lodge when David Lyall, a much-disliked colleague, is murdered. Did Lyall possess an ancient Viking manuscript that might be tied to Nazi mythology? Who ransacked his room before his execution? Did Forrester's friend Gordon Clark kill Lyall because of Lyall's affair with Clark's wife? Forrester is determined to help his friend as well as continue his archaeology studies. VERDICT References to J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis ground this book firmly in the postwar period in Oxford. Forrester has to cast aside his PTSD and rely on the skills developed from his espionage experience to ferret out the culprit and motive. A dashing new hero has been born; recommend for readers of Jack Higgins and Joseph Kanon. [See Prepub Alert, 11/6/15.]
Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
February 15, 2016
In the winter of 1946, Duncan Forrester, fresh from duty as a captain in the Special Operations Executive (SOE), is back at Oxford as a junior research fellow in archaeology when scholar David Lyall is murdered. Lyall was a less than admirable person with many adversaries, but the top suspect is Gordon Clark, with whose wife Lyall was having an affair. As Clark's closest friend, Forrester goes after the real killer, a quest that involves a missing Norse manuscript and travel to Germany and Norway as danger increases. The legacies of war remain fresh, notably in Forrester's loss of the woman he loved; when informed that Forrester was missing and believed dead, she joined SOE and was sent to France, where she was captured by the gestapo and shot. In the first of a series, Scott provides brief but vivid pictures of postwar austerity in a plot of nonstop action, including interactions with writers of note (Tolkien and C. S. Lewis at Oxford, Fleming and MacLean in London, Heyerdahl in Norway). Forrester, whose personal life takes a turn here, is a strong protagonist for this promising postwar series.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)