Book Review: the Sequel to Rogue Male – Rogue Justice, by Geoffrey Household

From a 1939 British first edition (third impression) of thriller writer Geoffrey Household's third novel, Rogue Male, we move on in this series of Household posts to his third-from-final novel – a book which is, in fact, a direct sequel to that hands-down classic, but published over forty years later:

Rogue Justice originally appeared in 1982, published in the UK by Michael Joseph – I blogged about that edition back 2010. The cover seen above, however, isn't that edition; it's the Top Notch Thrillers reissue, published by Mike Ripley's imprint in 2011 – just one of many overlooked thrillers that Mike has brought back into print. And it's great that Rogue Justice is widely available again, because even though it doesn't scale the lofty literary/thriller heights of its illustrious forebear, it's an intriguing novel nonetheless.

For a start, whereas in Rogue Male the identity of the European dictator the narrator attempted to assassinate at the beginning of the novel was never revealed, in Rogue Justice it's plainly stated that it was indeed Adolf Hitler. Not a huge or especially startling revelation, I know, but remember that Rogue Male was written and first published in peacetime, so basing a character on Hitler was pretty daring, even if he wasn't named. But we don't just learn the identity of the dictator in Rogue Justice: we also learn the name of the narrator of both novels. In Rogue Male, we're given to understand that our protagonist is noble enough in heritage that he's well-known in Britain, but we aren't told his name. In Rogue Justice, his name is finally revealed: Raymond Ingelram. (Curiously, in his 1977 survey Who's Who in Spy Fiction, Donald McCormick calls the narrator of Rogue Male "Sir Robert Hunter" – influenced, no doubt, by the 1976 Peter O'Toole BBC TV adaptation – an error he then repeats for his 1990 follow-up, Spy Fiction: A Connoisseur's Guide, published eight years after Household had named his lead Raymond Ingelram!)

Rogue Male ended with Ingelram determining to take another crack at killing Hitler – whose thugs murdered Ingelram's one true love – having survived a perilous pursuit by agents of Nazi Germany, in particular the cunning and savage Major Quive-Smith (or von Lauen, to give him his true name). Rogue Justice picks up his story four years later in 1942, and finds Ingelram languishing in a Rostock prison cell. As he explains, he used Quive-Smith's Nicaraguan passport – issued under the name Don Ernesto Menendez Peraza – to try and inveigle himself into German society as a Nazi sympathizer, in the hope of getting close enough to Hitler to off the bugger, but was unmasked and banged up instead. But a fortuitous RAF raid destroys the gaol in which he's being held, and he makes his escape, dressed as his now-dead captor, Hauptmann Haase.

From there, the action ranges across Nazi-occupied Europe, as, realising that he'll never be able to assassinate Hitler, Ingelram embarks instead on a quest to exact a different sort of vengeance. Effectively, he turns himself into a one-man army, falling in with the occasional resistance or guerilla movement, attacking German troops where he can, notching up a steadily increasing number of kills. In that sense, then, Rogue Justice is less focused than Rogue Male. In the former novel, Ingelram's aim was simple: to evade the enemy agents on his tail. In Rogue Justice, however, he becomes by turns pursuee, then attacker, then pursuee again, with no real purpose beyond slaughtering as many Germans soldiers as he can (and perhaps returning home to England).

But while Rogue Justice lacks Rogue Male's elegantly streamlined plot and consequent escalating tension, it does work as a kind of wartime travelogue, offering glimpses of life in occupied Poland (Ingelram has a near-brush with Auschwitz), Slovakia, Romania and Greece. And Ingelram remains an agreeable companion: resourceful (his long experience as a hunter comes in very handy here), obviously aristocratic yet never patronising towards the many downtrodden locals he meet, his observations are often barbed with a sly, witty sarcasm (Mike Ripley has written about how in Rogue Justice Household "has perfected the cool, very British (English) attitude of self-deprecation when under fire"; see this excellent Crime and Detective Stories article on the TNT/Ostara website).

Quite apart from its intriguing revelations as to the identity of the narrator of the novel (and its predecessor) and his intended target, Rogue Justice is interesting bibliographically too. The gap of forty-three years between the publication of Rogue Male and Rogue Justice must surely rank as the longest between a novel and its sequel (written by the same author) in publishing history (don't just take my word for it: Mike Ripley reckons that's the case as well). Then there's the fact that Rogue Male gained a sequel at all: Geoffrey Household didn't, as a rule, write sequels, and only one other novel in his canon besides Rogue Male was awarded a follow-up – although in that case the length of time between the two books was considerably shorter.

I'll be returning to those two novels later in this run of Household posts, but next I'll be looking at the two novels which precede Rogue Justice in Household's backlist – both of which boast cover designs by the same photographer-turned-professional fisherman responsible for the jacket photo on the Michael Joseph edition of Rogue Justice...

Rogue Male by Geoffrey Household; 1939 Chatto & Windus First Edition, Services Library Wrapper, Enid Marx Cover Design

Well the entries for my splendid Ilex Gift giveaway are rolling in, so if you haven't done so already, make sure to email me via the link in that post to be in with a chance of winning all those classic comics Little Books, Journals and what have you. But back to business. And business for the foreseeable future will largely concern a British writer of thrillers, suspense novels and spy fiction (among other genres) who I've touched on a number of times previously...

Geoffrey Household (1900–1988) had twenty-eight novels and novellas, seven short story collections and one autobiography published in his lifetime, but his best known book is still his fourth – his third novel – and his first thriller (the previous two novels being a children's novella and a philosophical character study) – Rogue Male (1939). I've written about Rogue Male before, when I reviewed it alongside J. G. Ballard's Concrete Island and William Boyd's Ordinary Thunderstorms – both of which, in common with Household's novel, feature protagonists who find themselves cast adrift from society – back in 2010, eventually ranking it the fourth best book I read that year. But this elegantly written, exciting, engrossing, landmark novel has only risen in my estimations since then – I'd probably place it at number three in that chart these days, beaten only by John le Carré's Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy and Richard Stark's The Hunter – which is why, despite owning a 1949 Penguin paperback first printing of the book (in fact two copies), I bagged this more recently, from Addyman Books in Hay-on-Wye:

A 1939 Chatto & Windus UK hardback first edition. Now, this isn't the first printing of the novel; it is, in fact, the third impression, issued in the same year as the first and second impressions. True (British) first editions are extremely uncommon, and even more so in a dustjacket: there are currently just two copies of the true first on AbeBooks, both sans jacket, one for £300, the other for £450. Even secondhand book dealers of long experience, such as Any Amount of Books on London's Charing Cross Road, have never handled a jacketed copy of the book. But as you can see, this third impression does have a jacket – designed by noted painter and pattern-maker Enid Marx; Independent obituary here – although its design differs from that of the true first.

See, with the advent of the Second World War in 1939, Chatto & Windus reissued ten of their books as Services Library editions, all with suitably patriotic red, white and blue dustjackets (and possibly blue boards; my copy of Rogue Male has blue boards, as opposed to the original printing's black boards), intended for British servicemen (and women). There's a list of the Services Library books on the back of this edition of Rogue Male:

In the case of Rogue Male, I'm uncertain as to whether the novel went into the Services Library as of the second or third impression – I've never seen a picture of the second impression, let alone a copy for sale online – so I don't know if the third impression is the first appearance of the novel in the Services Library wrapper (the original wrapper shows the novel's nameless narrator lining up in his sights the equally nameless dictator – obviously intended to be Hitler – he's attempting to assassinate); if anyone owns a second impression – or indeed a first impression – and is perhaps willing to show their copy to the world, do please leave a comment below. But what I do know – or at least think I know; I could be wrong – is that the copy of Rogue Male seen in this post was the earliest jacketed printing of the Chatto & Windus first for sale online (until I bought it, that is): there is one other jacketed UK first on AbeBooks at present, but that's a fourth impression from 1941 (priced at eighty-odd quid, plus shipping from the States).

So it's a nice addition to my select Geoffrey Household collection – select, but growing, as we'll discover in this run of posts. Before we get to some of those other Household books, however – one or two of which are really quite special – I thought I'd post a review of a much later novel – one I've actually covered before (bibliographically – and bibliophiliacally – rather than critically): the 1982 sequel to Rogue Male, Rogue Justice...

Ilex Gift Giveaway! WIN! Classic Comics Journals, Postcard Books, Little Books and a Magnet Set!

NB: COMPETITION NOW CLOSED

It's giveaway time on Existential Ennui! Woo-hoo! And unlike the last competition I ran, where American readers could win Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy movie merchandise, this time the giveaway is open to all Existential Ennui readers across the globe: US, UK, European, Australian – you name it. (Go on: tell me where you're reading this post from in the comments; I dare you.) And even better, there's no daft question to answer!

I've got quite the haul of swag this time, too, all courtesy of Ilex Gift, the newly launched gift (er, obviously) line of Ilex Press, the Lewes-based publisher where I work. Shameless self-promotion? You betcha! But who cares when the prizes on offer are so numerous and splendorous.

Here's what you can win: 

THREE lucky readers will each receive:

6 x Little Books:

• Little Book of Vintage Romance 
• Little Book of Vintage Sci-Fi 
• Little Book of Vintage Combat 
• Little Book of Vintage Crime 
• Little Book of Vintage Sauciness 
• Little Book of Vintage Horror
Each bijou book contains classic 1950s comic strips, original adverts, short stories and more besides, plus an introductory essay about the source material. (Counter pack not included, I'm afraid.)

2 x Journals:

• Lovelorn Journal
• Tales of Terror Journal
Featuring quirky quotes from '50s romance and horror comics on lined, gridded and blank paper, and a pocket in the back for keeping ephemera, souvenirs and letters.

2 x Postcard Books:

• Lovelorn: 30 Postcards
• Tales of Terror: 30 Postcards
Each of the 30 postcards – or rather, 60 postcards, seeing as there are two sets – sports a classic romance or horror comic book cover, with artist and publication info on the back, all wrapped in a fold-out die-cut cover.

1 x Magnet Pack:

• Lovelorn: 16 Classic Romance Comic Magnets
Kitsch and kooky romance comic covers to slap on your fridge, plus a booklet revealing the stories behind the covers.

That all adds up to a not-to-be-sniffed-at £76 – or US$120 – worth of swag!

So how do you enter? Simple! Just email your name and address (or leave a comment on this post, although you'll still need to send your address in) using the subject line "I WANT TO WIN THE ILEX GIFT STUFF" to:

existentialennui@gmail.com

The competition closes Thursday 29 March at midnight EST – giving you just under two weeks to enter – with all entries going into Ilex Gift supremo Tim Pilcher's vintage RAF pilot's hat, from which the three winners will be drawn. And I'll be announcing those winners (barring mishaps) on Friday 30 March. Good luck! Oh, and the Ilex Gift range will be widely available online and at all fine book emporiums from next month, so follow the above links for more info.

Next on Existential Ennui: Geoffrey Household...

Charles Kelly on Dan J. Marlowe

(NB: A version of this post also appears on The Violent World of Parker blog.)

Ooh, look at this: two posts in one day. Crikey. Although this one's more of a link, really, prompted by Violent World of Parker supremo Trent, who drew my attention to an article at the Los Angeles Review of Books, which Trent tweeted about earlier (as did spy novelist Jeremy Duns; it was also linked by The Rap Sheet the other day). It's a great piece on hard-boiled crime writer Dan J. Marlowe – the subject, of course, of a recent run of Violent World of Parker and Existential Ennui posts – written by Marlowe aficionado and biographer Charles Kelly. Charles left a number of comments on this EE Dan Marlowe post and this TVWoP one, and currently has an essay about Marlowe in the back of the third issue of Ed Brubaker and Sean Phllips's comic book Fatale, but the Los Angeles Review of Books article – which is ostensibly about Marlowe's time in Hollywood – has some startling revelations in it, including the fact that many of Marlowe's novels were co-written with a US Air Force Colonel. It's well worth a few minutes of your time, so go give it a read, why don'cha. And I'll be back before too long with that promised competition...

The Lewes Book Fair: An Appreciation

Photo Copyright © 2012 Rachel Day

Well I hope we all enjoyed the interview with novelist Christopher Nicole I posted on Monday, and indeed the second part of Chris Lyons's Richard Stark/Parker essay, "The Wolf Man" – available, of course, on The Violent World of Parker blog. And since I seem to be developing a blogging theme this week of posts-which-require-little-to-no-writing-on-my-part, and seeing as this Saturday (17 March) marks the return of the Lewes Book Fair to the fair East Sussex county town in which, dare we forget, I both live and work, I thought I'd persist with that not-much-effort-on-my-part-required theme and post an article I wrote about the fair for local listings magazine Viva Lewes last year.

It's a little out of date now – you'll note I mention May's fair; there have been a few more since then – but I was fairly pleased with it at the time, and I think it pithily summarizes what makes the Lewes Book Fair special. The photos illustrating the article are taken from the website of local animal rescue charity Paws & Claws, the backers and beneficiaries of the event – there are lots more pictures on their site. (The photo at the top of this post, however, which shows some of the books I've bought at the fair, is by Rachel Day, whose website can be found here.) If you're in the area on Saturday, perhaps I'll see you at the fair (although I'll only be making a fleeting appearance, early doors), but failing that, check back here tomorrow for another exclusive Existential Ennui competition – and this time the competition will be open not only to American EE readers, but to UK and worldwide readers too...

. . . . . . . . . .

The Lewes Book Fair

Once every few months, just before 10am on a Saturday, a small queue forms at the Fisher Street entrance of Lewes Town Hall. On first inspection this assembly might seem entirely respectable: a polite concatenation of beige middle age. But look closer, and you’ll glimpse a fevered anticipation in their eyes…

They’re queuing for the Lewes Book Fair, a staple of the local bibliophile’s calendar. Held five times a year, the fair is a chance for book hounds to peruse the wares of a variety of secondhand booksellers, big and small, all hawking books on subjects as varied as topography, history, local interest and nature, not to mention fiction – first editions and paperbacks a-plenty – poetry and assorted paraphernalia. If it’s the printed word you’re after, the Lewes Book Fair caters to all.

Set up by Lewesian John Beck in 1992, the fair began on a twice-yearly basis with twenty stallholders. These days it’s more like forty, with between 400 and 500 punters attending each fair from as far afield as London and Southampton, as well as Lewes and Sussex. The most recent event in May was typically crowded; an hour in it became tricky to navigate the two long aisles of stalls there were so many people poring over old tomes. But I did spot a signed first edition of Conan Doyle’s 1891 historical adventure The White Company (£500), a very scare first of David Nobbs’s The Death of Reginald Perrin (£165) and, more in my price range (so of course I bought ’em), a book club edition of John Gardner’s first Bond novel Licence Renewed (a steal at two quid) and an early printing of Dennis Wheatley’s innovative 1936 crime fiction dossier Murder off Miami (£6).

The Lewes fair is just one of many such independent events held up and down the country every weekend – on average fifty per month – but having attended a good number in other parts of the UK, I can report that ours remains among the best. I asked John – who runs the fair with his daughter Melanie and friends, and who is an avid book collector himself – why that is. 

“I think Lewes is still popular as we regularly get good footfall and bargains are always to be had,” he told me. “The book trade is suffering from the internet and e-books, but fortunately many buyers still like the tactility of a book, which to many is a piece of art in its own way. Also, by having the book in your hand you can better judge the condition and ‘value for money’ if one is a collector.”

John’s dream is to instigate a Lewes Book Week, based around the fair but featuring “book readings, book signings and talks on the literary heritage that Lewes has. Hay-on-Wye have a very successful annual event, which is well hyped, and Hay is a place with no real literary history at all. So Lewes has a great advantage in many respects.”

Indeed it does. I feel a campaign coming on... 

An Interview with Christopher Nicole, alias Andrew York, Author of the Jonas Wilde Eliminator Spy Novels (and More Besides)

As promised, to start the working week I have another exclusive Existential Ennui interview for you. Previously I've posted Q&As with Dexter creator Jeff Lindsay and espionage novelist Anthony Price; today it's the turn of an author who, like Price, penned a series of spy novels, but who, uniquely, has also written a quite remarkable number of other novels besides: Christopher Nicole.

I blogged about Nicole at the beginning of the year, specifically the excellent series of books he wrote under the pen name (one of many) Andrew York in the 1960s and early '70s, starring Britain's state executioner Jonas Wilde, a.k.a. The Eliminator. I was tipped off to the Wilde novels by John at Pretty Sinister Books, when John reviewed the first instalment in the series, 1966's The Eliminator, in August of last year. John has since progressed a lot further in the series than I have, which was why I asked him to contribute half the questions to this Q&A, for which I thank him. Thanks also to Mike Ripley at Top Notch Thrillers for setting up the interview, which was conducted via email last month; Mike has been reissuing the Jonas Wilde books since last year, and the latest books, The Predator and The Deviator, are available now.

John and I concentrate in large part on the Jonas Wilde novels in the interview because those are the books with which we're most familiar (the answers Nicole gives to some of our more convoluted, crackpot-theoretical questions about the books are amusingly prosaic). But the Wilde series is but a tiny part of Nicole's backlist; as will become clear, there's a hell of a lot more to this writer than spy thrillers... 

NICK JONES/JOHN NORRIS: You've been astonishingly prolific in your career – you've had more than 100 books published, I believe, probably a lot more (do you know the total?), and under a dizzying array of aliases. To what do you credit your fecundity?

CHRISTOPHER NICOLE: When Queen of Glory is published in May, it will be number 210. Three of these are non-fiction. I have always written because I enjoy telling stories; that more than 35,000,000 people have seen fit to buy my books never ceases to amaze me. 

Are the many nom de plumes you've written under a consequence of having written so many books, or is there another reason for using so many aliases? Writing in different genres, perhaps?

Andrew York was my first pseudonym. I wanted a break from my historical novels and my then publishers, Hutchinson, thought that in view of the drastic change in genre we should have a different name. Later pseudonyms were usually caused by contractual difficulties; writing for different publishers at the same time. 

Was it always your intention to write in different genres – romance, espionage, historical, adventure, etc. – or do you simply write and not think about where the novel will fit?

I am sorry to say that the Jonas Wilde books are my only venture into spy fiction per se. Anna Fehrbach, while a natural progression from Wilde, and is an altogether more rounded and attractive character, is technically World War II. I am an Historical Novelist by choice. Nowadays WWII seems to be included in the Historical category. But as I lived through it it seems like yesterday. 

Anthony Price once remarked that the past is lying in wait for the present. As someone with a passion for history, is that a statement you'd agree with?

I entirely agree. One of the most distressing aspects of modern education, and therefore society, is the neglect of knowledge of where we come from. H. G. Wells wrote that to confront an enemy is to look into the red, hate-filled eyes, of Neanderthal man.

Would it be fair to say that many of your novels are informed by a sense of place? Whether that be the West Indies, where you were raised, or the Channel Island of Guernsey, where you live and which, of course, features in the Jonas Wilde novels as part of The Route. Is location an inspiration for you?

I am concerned only with plot and character. The background is drawn in afterwards. However, whenever possible, I have visited the location where the book is set. 

You've lived and worked on Guernsey since, I believe, 1957 (correct me if I'm wrong!). I've been there myself a few times and love the island. What was it about Guernsey that first attracted you, and what keeps you there?

I had never set foot on Guernsey until, on passage to the Mediterranean [Nicole is a keen yachtsman], I misjudged the tides in fog and struck a rock off the west coast. It was necessary to put into St Peter Port and have the damage assessed and repaired. By the time this was done we had liked the island and the people so much that we bought a house and have used the island as a base ever since. 

What inspired you to begin writing spy novels, specifically the Jonas Wilde ones?

As mentioned above, Wilde was a break in my routine. I have never read a spy novel but after seeing a couple of Bond movies with their absurd and increasing obsession with gadgetry I did not see how I could do worse. 

Very few spy novels during the period you wrote the Jonas Wilde books had a character arc, or changed and developed throughout the books. And I can't think of any who aged through the series as Jonas does (Anthony Price's David Audley novels aside). Was it intentional that things like Wilde's sciatica and his haunted past with Jocelyn be recurring features in the books? How important do you think it is to readers to better know a series character over the course of several books?

To me, as with all my characters, when I was writing about him Wilde was a living, breathing human being sitting beside me at my desk. All processes were a natural progression. 

The women characters far outshine the men in the Wilde novels, in my opinion. Often, as in the case of Glorious Torro, Jonas seems to have met his match. What led you to focus on the women in these books?

I hate to confess this, but women have always been my hobby. So I enjoy writing about them. Nearly all of my big historicals have been about women.

I was surprised by what I call genre blending in some of the Wilde books. The Coordinator to me seemed like a throwback to the old 1930s pulp magazines with its blind character and his sonic glasses and his glass furniture. There was also the mad scientist and his cryogenic experiments in the finale. The Deviator had an element of science fiction it as well with the invention of the impervious alloy Tition. Where did those ideas come from? Are you a fan of old science fiction or the pulp magazines? Which writers have you read, if any?

As indicated above, I never relate my work to anyone else's and therefore do not consider my work as belonging to a genre. I have never read any science fiction save for my boyhood hero John Carter on Mars. 

I'm always interested to find out if a writer I enjoy is familiar with writers who came before him. Are you familiar with any of the early spy writers who were popular in the early part of the 20th century? Like Oppenheim, William LeQuex or Francis Beeding? Maybe someone else?

I have actually read an Oppenheim, simply because I was once interested in buying the house he lived in in Guernsey. I don't remember what the book was about. My reading almost entirely history and biography. In my novel reading days it was Hemingway, Maugham and wild historical romance such as Sabatini. 

What happened to Wilde's taste for Bacardi? I liked waiting for the scene when I would be introduced to yet another odd "Cocktail of the Book" and was disappointed when the unusual rum cocktails like the Moscow Mule and the Bijou disappeared and Jonas was suddenly a Scotch drinker. Or in one instance was forced to drink sherry! Did you forget about the Bacardi? Did your publisher think it was too much free advertising? Or did Jonas sort of take over and change his mind for you?

Again, I don't analyse my work to that extent. Wilde drank Bacardi because I drank Bacardi. Towards the end of the series I had switched to Scotch. 

Finally, which of your many novels are you most proud of, and why?

This is a tricky one with such a choice. Ratoon would have to be my favourite simply because it was my first big seller: over 2,000,000 copies in the States. Lord of the Golden Fan ranks high as does Ottoman. I consider the two Jane Digby novels as my best. But my favourite character of all is, and I think always will be, Anna Fehrbach: the Angel series.