Operation Pax (1951)

Blurb:

My review:

The object of Operation Pax is to sap the will-power and reduce populations to comatose vegetables, which is exactly the effect it has on the reader.  After the bizarre but effective opening, involving the utterly contemptible conman Routh, it runs out of vim.  The Oxford scenes are long-winded and singularly unamusing, populated by stereotypical dons and ghastly children of the sort that ought to be strangled at birth.  When the action “shifts gear” into a more thrillerish line, the book becomes merely dull: chases and abductions are inadequate compensation for an absence of detective interest and the irrelevance of Appleby.  At the end, a rather surprising villain is revealed, surprising only because the book relies, as it should never do, on a single clue.

To the Bibliography.

To the Michael Innes Page.

To the Grandest Game in the World.

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