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THE WILDERNESS IS YOURS by Rose Thurburn

THE WILDERNESS IS YOURS

By

Pub Date: July 26th, 1950
Publisher: Morrow

Of British derivation, this story of personal opportunism and political treason deals in certain abstractions of time and place (a Balkan country and a pattern which is reminiscent of Tito and Mihailovitch), is almost clinical in its detachment from its participants, spare and severe. Slade, whose self-concern also excludes all personal passions and pleasures, promises aid to a guerilla leader Patkov against Kapska, The Enemy. When Patkov proves to be a lost cause, Slade defaults, sacrifices Patkov and his subordinate, a young Englishman, to Kapska, extricates himself from an inquiry by his superior, and continues his self-interested career. An effective portrayal of precarious politics and a conscienceless character, this is not however for general tastes in fiction.