Customer Reviews

Sinkiang Executive

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

"The Sinkiang Executive", Elleston Trevor's eighth installment of Quiller, is an oddly confounding amalgam that surrealy catches our flawed protagonist in a state of moral ambiguity. Then, for a hundred pages in the middle, it misuses the momentum of that premise simply as an excuse to indulge in an outlandish aeronautical fantasy. In what becomes the book's seemingly-abbreviated third portion, Quiller's actual mission may ultimately be worth holding out for if only for the conflict that arises over what the Bureau forces him into. The eventual "plot" of that mission though seems a little too simple, a little too obvious. Likewise, Kirinski's repetitious dialogue at the end is quite silly. Nonetheless, the climax remains a gripping read.

Kirinski does make a unique and compelling villain, who is himself flawed and driven by the same dark motivations that Quiller has. Kirinski becomes a ruthless, formidable enemy whom the hero can ultimately identify with. "The reasons why we go into this trade are varied and we never talk about it because it's always personal...and we don't question even ourselves...because we don't want to come up with an answer we can't live with. I'd put Kirinski down as a psychopath. That is the type I know best, and for good reason." (183) After feeling satisfaction for having murdered a Soviet agent on a train full of witnesses, Quiller appears to be losing control. Likewise, his paltry justification for having done so seems to be an attempt to try and absolve guilt over his own responsibility in the death of a female friend. (In terms of continuity, Trevor states this as being Quiller's sixteenth mission. Apparently not all of them warranted full accounts.) The situation creates a compelling tension that moves to further erode the long-waning trust between Quiller and his Bureau.

Trevor works hard to add credibility in the minute details of Quiller's MiG 28D Finback training and insertion. Unfortunately, the concept of speed training an intelligence agent to be a jet fighter pilot seems to ill fit the Quiller character. There would be hundreds of trained pilots in both the US Air Force and the RAF with more experience for such an aerial reconnaissance mission. The concept seems flawed and all the details add up to little more than tedium. The fact that Ferris shows up by a normal airline flight and later dismisses the aerial photography as a mere "ticket" to the actual mission makes the idea seem all the more pointless. The scenario is often too reminiscent of the Craig Thomas novel "Firefox" (which was published the previous year). Another thing never alluded to is Quiller's ability to speak Russian perfectly and in a dialect that never arouses suspicion from the natives. Bond or Bourne could get away with it, but one of Quiller's advantages has always been its realism. "The Sinkiang Executive" is too often a conflict that pits realistic insight against unbelievable flights of fancy.

Agreed with the previous one in general. I think the beginning, the idea that they wanna sack him & the way they coax him into this new mission are actually more interesting than the execution of the mission itself. And it's indeed a pity the reference to the other mission that led to the murder he committed for the girl in Prague isn't among the other stories: for awhile I kept looking for it. Especially a pity, because many references are indeed linked. However, later in Quiller Salamander there'll be a reference to the episode when Quiller killed "for his own reasons".

Not the greatest of the Quiller series but certainly something different. Quiller, facing the sack as a result of exposing the Bureau to hazard finds himself in a Russian MIG, exposed to a Bureau double-agent and facing the wrath of Ferris as the price for his re-admission to the Bureau. My only real criticism of the book is that some of the 'threads' into other (unwritten) stories are not explored and look like they never will be. Quiller saves the day but as usual winds up smelling like something from the local garbage dump. Really enjoyed the opening of this one!

There is a lot more info on the Quiller series at www.quiller.net, a fan site.

Early on in this 'ripped-from-the-headlines' yarn (written not long after a brand-new Soviet fighter did in fact land at, as I recall, a Japanese airfield), the hero reveals one of the things that sets him apart from his demonstrative supervisor, Ferris.

It's his poker face...and there are certainly moments throughout the series where it comes in handy. Actually, 24/7, since he is always bluffing.

His observation led me to remember the last Adam Hall thriller I read, The Kobra Manifesto, and how much that plot was indeed like a poker tournament--how often in fact the Q stories are, with the obvious difference that the losers in each round didn't generally get to go home in one piece.

Also: none of the other players--with their dogs and black belts and bright lights and sometimes surface-to-air missiles--none of them are ever bluffing.

As the good reviewers before have noted, The Sinkiang Executive is different from the very outset. Q does the unforgivable, putting the heat on a bunch of cranky old boffins--the ones who orchestrate unimaginably difficult tasks but who prefer to stay unimagined.

Perhaps he was simply angry having just returned--after a three day diet in 5 degree weather, oh, and with a bullet wound--from a failed mission. Failure doesn't suit his book. In any sense.

But Hall knows there is good cause-and-effect as well. In church today the liturgy reminded of how suffering leads to, strengthens hope. Hope is here as always Quiller's trump card, strengthened as it has been over time.

As for me? Personally? Faced with a lack of air conditioning? I will always start to complain. Add to that having to decide in the next three seconds whether you're more likely to explode or to be drawn-and-quartered...anyway, I would have forgotten the camera.

In the end, again as always, the hero is bluffing. What was the saying Arthur Ashe gave to us? Start where you are, use what you have (here a Soviet colonel's uniform) and (mostly) do what you can.

Spoiler alert: Q does that, yes.