Exhausting

As with previous Goddard novels the intricate plotting, doublecrosses and high body count are pretty exhausting. But the books keep your interest as guessing what will happen next is impossible.

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Conclusion of Trilogy

The narrator was once again excellent. All the characters were immediately identifiable, despite hugely varying accents and genders. This was the conclusion of a trilogy and therefore a long tale, but the ending felt a bit rushed. There felt to be a few loose ends, but it was left with the potential of a forth book.

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Chapters?

They would have been nice! Decent story to wrap things up, in a good storyline. Not Goddard's best, by any means, but it doesn't need to be - it's still better than most. Well-narrated (let's overlook the awful French pronunciations!), but that lack of chaptering made for a difficult tracking. What was Audible thinking?

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2 people found this helpful

No feel for Japan

Struggled with this one, for all his feel for Japan, it might just as well have been Las Vegas or Lesmahagow.
Not to Goddard's usual standard.

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I've been here before

I have to begin by saying how much I enjoyed this trilogy. Not entirely surprising as I usually like Goddard's books but also because I like the George Smiley Tinker Taylor trilogy and Fleming's You Only Live Twice, which all echo most strongly here.
it's not so much the story as the scenario, British Secret Service and a mysterious Japanese castle.
The characters are well done and I was invested in the story. Goddard has an annoying habit of bringing the story to a stop by frustrating the hero's progress just as an important reveal is to happen and he does it with annoying regularity. There is less of it than usual, thank goodness in this series and we have a hero we can admire, which is not always the case.
One of the better ones.

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Probably the best trilogy I've listened to in...

...years. To fit the flow of his stories the author comes up with some very odd occurrences, but then I guess if he didn't then the 3 books become 2 books. Max sees a letter at the end of the 2nd book but before he can read it, Sadiq steals it but saves him from execution by Dombreau - why save him but steal something from him? Equally in the same instance, the man is about to kill him but then is tied up himself but Max subsequently does a deal (and trusts a man who was about to execute him) with the same fellow - it just beggars belief... he doesn't then read that letter until a third of the way through the third book and you wait until half way through for him to share it with his friends (and therefore us the reader)

That said, it's a really good yarn and one both loved and recommend - usually where authors who do this are concerned, I simply get angry - but this an interesting spy story and because it is so good, I can forgive most things...

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a jolly good adventure, but let down by Audible

An old fashioned adventure book. Slightly predictable but very hard to manage if you are listening in sessions as Audible have not bothered to divide it in to ANY CHAPTERS!!

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3 people found this helpful

Holiday

A good story but dragged out in parts unnecessarily. But still a good story worth listening to.

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1 person found this helpful

Great story. Too many unanswered q’s and examples of extraordinary good luck

The story was completely engrossing and the audiobook narration was fantastic. It’s a really interesting story and there’s plenty of drama and intrigue. If you’ve read a lot of WWII thrillers, as I have, this was a welcome change.
But this really needed an editor. No spoilers, but through the trilogy some really big issues are left unresolved in a way that is exasperating, not clever or compelling. Sometimes there was a sea of detail that became confusing and unnecessary. Too often there were times where the characters got what they wanted bc of extraordinarily luck or somewhat inexplicable choices by other characters.
I would recommend this series for sure, but it’s not quite up to the standard of other writers.

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2 many credits

Decent story but it was told over 3 books. It coukd have been told over 2. Fortunately the last two books were available in a 2 for 1 offer.

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