The Jansen Directive by
Robert Ludlum
hbk out January 03
Published by Orion
at £17.99
Robert Ludlum has sold more than two-hundred million copies of his
twenty-two novels, making him probably the world's best-seller. This is yet
another of his highly unbelievable conspiracy yarns, spread over 547 pages
of unlikely events, somewhat similar to the James Bond sagas, but without
the humour and glamour of Ian Fleming.
This time, the square-jawed, clean-limbed American hero is Paul Janson, a
retired US governmental fixer and killer, who is persuaded to go to the
rescue of a Hungarian billionaire, a super-philanthropist who once saved his
own life. The said Hungarian has been seized at a peace conference by evil
Islamic fundamentalists on a mythical island state in the Indian Ocean. The
leader of the terrorists is 'The Caliph', a thinly disguised bin Laden, and is to
be beheaded next Friday.
The story so far reminded me of a rather cynical booklet I once read, which
was a writer's manual on how to devise plots. The author reckoned that all
thrillers were variants on one basic situation – "There's a man in Zanzibar
with a cork up his ass and the only person who can remove it, is in jail in
Moscow"!
With a handful of fellow supermen, including one IRA chap instantly
released from Wormwood Scrubs for the purpose, Janson helicopters to the
island and with another guy, parachutes from a great height at night through
thick cloud to land smack in the middle of the fort where the prisoner is
being held, without being seen by the hundreds of fanatical guards.
Amongst all the various equipment dangling from his person, he has two live
rats, which he throws at the nearest guards, to distract them while he shoots
them. Then they penetrate a dungeon where the Hungarian is being kept and
dispatch another seventeen fanatical Muslims, before blowing a hole in the
fort and escaping to a boat.
What happens after page 132, I cannot tell you, as I just could not face
another four hundred pages in similar vein. However, based on his sales
figures, there must be at least ten million folk out there who are made of
stronger stuff.
(
Bernard Knight
ex Home Office Pathologist and author of the highly acclaimed Crowner John series)
