Eclipse - Softcover

At the center of this convoluted fiction debut by the author of A Man Called Intrepid is an elusive character named Radzki who had some mysterious connection with Nazi war criminal Rudolf Hess in the heat of WW II. Scott Talbott, star of an American TV news show, first hears of Radzki when he interviews Hess in prison, a journalistic coup he brings off following the disappearance of his show's producer while investigating the reason so many governments remain intent on keeping Hess away from the press. With the help of London colleague Sally Ryan, Talbott attempts to unravel a labyrinthine identity puzzle surrounding "Radzki." He turns out to be a Zionist who had allowed Stalin to set him up as a Soviet spy working under Hess and who is now still active as a powerful Jewish mole inside the Kremlin. Radzki, Talbott discovers, was also the man his mother had sheltered in England during the war and whom he had known as Uncle Samuel. This is a frustrating, poorly organized novel, all the more disappointing because its shortcomings obscure a potentially fascinating character and premise.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Why did Rudolf Hess fly to England in 1941? Was he alone? Which countries were the real friends of the German Jews? Hoping to solve these decades-old enigmas, Scott Talbott, a leading U.S. TV reporter, asks for, and is granted, the first-ever interview with Hess. Needless to say, Talbott's pursuit of the truth interests neo-Nazis as well as the international intelligence community. So, without a score card, he and colleague Sally Ryan cannot tell the agents from the double agents in Germany, Yugoslavia, England, and the United States. The nonstop action climaxes at Remembrance Day in London, where world leaders are held hostage by terrorists. Author of the popular A Man Called Intrepid , Stevenson seems to know the intelligence field. But that does not compensate for the uneven plotting and characterizations that lessen, rather than heighten, the suspense. V. Louise Saylor, Eastern Washington Univ. Lib., Cheney
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.