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THE SOLSTICE MAN by Derry Quinn

THE SOLSTICE MAN

By

Pub Date: April 24th, 1978
Publisher: St. Martin's

Here we go again. PLO Marxists vs. Israeli Mossad terrorists in the South of France, and--in the middle--the CIA, French security, a vigilante anti-terrorist French-Haitian motorcycle gang called the ""Chevaliers de St. Michel,"" and an English has-been spy named Archie Snow. If that sounds both tired and confusing, it is, which is a pity, because Quinn (Limbo Connection, 1977) writes too smoothly and crisply to be wasting his time following errand-boy Archie--who hasn't much time to be a character, what with finding bodies (instead of microfilm) in Nice, being used by the CIA to lure the Israelis into a death-trap, trying to prevent the assassination of an Israeli biggie, and learning that the Arabs have hundreds of Sam 7 missiles in the Alpes-Maritimes. Quinn obviously has some strong anti-Israel sentiments to express (non-Jewish Archie once studied the Talmud and tells Israelite Leah that ""I think Israel has brought out the worst in you""), but they're lost in an overpopulated muddle that no amount of British stylishness can salvage.