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WATCH IT, DR. ADRIAN by Boyd Litzinger

WATCH IT, DR. ADRIAN

By

Pub Date: Sept. 28th, 1977
Publisher: Putnam

Shades--pale, silly shades--of Buchan, Hitchcock, et al. when innocent bystander and Browning scholar Matthew Adrian, off to England on a sabbatical, is chosen to be the unknowing courier of a CIA-planted microfilm message (in his wristwatch); snatched and delivered by a duped Soviet spy, it will sow dissent among OPEC nation leaders meeting in Oxford. But the US policy suddenly shifts, and CIA agents join the Adrian-hunters--Brits, Russians, and a private, OPEC-hating cartel--all with different reasons for coveting that wristwatch. Adrian catches on quickly and (unconvincingly) decides to play coy instead of safe, shifting the microfilm's hiding place, brawling with gunmen and maulers, romancing a literate, soon-to-be-kidnapped smasher, and leading the British to believe that he's an assassin aiming for a Mideast potentate. There is, in fact, an assassin on the prowl, but he turns out to be harmless, as does this entire comedy-suspense folderol set in and around loverly Oxford. Anglophiles may want to breeze along for the fringe benefits, and those who hunger for dry wit in any package whatsoever can extract a pleaser here and there. Otherwise--forget it, Dr. Adrian.