Friday's Forgotten Books:
Rogue Male by Geoffrey Household
When I was a kid I pretty much only read comics. And I almost never read the books that teachers told us to read. And the few 'school' books that I did read were usually like wading through molasses. Except this. Which I loved.
Rogue Male was written and is set in 1938. Our hero is a posh bloke who fails to assasinate an unnamed European dictator who is obviously Adolf Hitler - yes, that old chestnut. He is caught, tortured and then escapes but he is hunted across Europe by the mad, bad Nazis.
I read Rogue Male a few years ago after a break of about thirty years and still enjoyed it. It's a bit stiff in it's upper lip, like Buchan's The 39 Steps, but is a nice, fast paced read.
You'll find mor Forgotten Books at Patti Abbott's blog, which is here
9 comments:
It sounds like a winner to me.
Surely one of the greats.
Most books don't hold up over time. That this one does is a good indicator that it's well worth reading. I've never even heard of it, so it wasn't on my reading list as a teen or college student. Thanks for writing about it today.
I remember this as one of the first adult paperbacks I had as a kid. Seems like I expected it to be racy, but liked it anyway.
You had a much different college reading list than I did, but it would have been nice to have such titles included. Better late than never, as they say. I don't mind the dated bits, either, as it helps set a book in context with what's happening in the world at the time (and also a good lesson in stylistic changes through the years).
Hmm...my comment, actually question, seems to have gone missing (but Blogspot's been acting up on me all day)...was ROGUE MALE actually assigned or a sort of extra credit sort of thing? How were the classroom discussions?
Todd, this was when I was about thirteen, I left school at 16. I didn't do English Lit.
The teacher just had a handful of books for the kids to read and write about, that was it. I wasn't at school a lot anyway so I missed out on The Pan Book Of Horror Stories, which was what I really wanted to read, and ended up with this.
And it worked for me, as Hunter used to say.
The chances of a classroom discussion at my school were slim enough to be anorexic. My English teacher was famous for punching my brother in law and knocking him out, though.
Great job describing the book. Made me wan to read it. I know I am late to the game on this, but I read your story THE FINAL CUT the other day. Absolutely loved it.
It's a great thriller.
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