Pol Koutsakis

At the risk of sounding very conceited and self-assured (I know, I know, a dirty word) I think people were very easily satisfied back in the 1970s. After all, just look at any of the re-runs of old episodes of Top of the Pops that proliferate on BBC4.

I think that that acceptance of lamentable mediocrity also extended to our expectations from thrillers. Desmond Bagley and Alistair Maclean achieved great success with formulaic adventure stories that barely even paid lip service to consideration of cohesive and plausible plots or deployment of plausible characters. Before I go any further, I have to admit to having enjoyed them immensely. I was, however, just thirteen or fourteen, and probably couldn’t even spell literary discernment, far less display it.

Unfortunately, forty years on, my tolerance for such pap is now conspicuous by its absence, so I had very little time for this rather chaotic novel from Pol Koutsakis. Not even the novelty of its setting in Athens was enough to rescue it in my eyes, and the feeling of catharsis when I left it in the box of books being collected for a charity shop in a Knutsford supermarket was glorious.… (meer)