![]() For the most part, Grady uses actual places. If the main character needs some action, he’s going to get it without having to earn it.įor me, the funnest part of reading this was seeing Washington, DC in 1974. As the romance genre is female fantasy, thrillers are male fantasy. She could have done better than a shady guy on the run who pulled her out of a diner at gunpoint and made her cook him dinner. Still, this woman was healthy and attractive and she had a job. This was the first generation to come of age with birth control, AIDS didn’t exist yet, and there was a general sexual openness now that men and women could enjoy themselves without fear of pregnancy, commitment, or social stigma. I get that the early seventies was a more freewheeling era. The main character even abducts a woman at gunpoint and through some charm that is entirely invisible to the reader, gains her confidence, sleeps with her, and convinces her to flee with him even though she knows he’s being pursued by trained killers who will slaughter anyone he happens to be with. The story has some sections that are hard to swallow, including some phone calls where the main character uses unconvincing stories to trick impossibly gullible clerks into divulging sensitive information. The cat and mouse game is pretty good, with the overmatched protagonist surviving by wits, grit, and luck. You don’t get that as much as you’d hope when the author is constantly explaining things to you. On the other hand, part of the lure of the thriller genre is the feeling of experiencing the action in real time with the protagonist. I appreciate concise exposition, and some descriptions of the CIA’s activities and procedures were fascinating. You can see the effect of his journalistic training in his writing, which favors exposition and telling over immersing the reader in the action. The author had studied journalism in college, and later worked as a journalist in DC. At bottom, it’s a conspiracy novel exposing some of shadier operations of powerful governments, and the lengths to which those governments will go to cover up their crimes. I think much of the book’s initial success came from it being the right story at the right time. The plot itself was okay, but the writing and characterization left a lot to be desired. I’m generally not a big fan of spy thrillers, but I wanted to read this one because so many fans of the genre consider it a classic. Also included for the first time in print along with the original is the 50 page treatment that Grady produced for that missing movie - a treatment that Grady refers to as a reimagining, entitled condor.Six Days of the Condor by James Grady September 14, 2020 This brand new edition includes an new introduction by James Grady giving details of the circumstances that led to him originally writing the book, what happened subsequently and how he was approached by Hollywood a few years ago to help with a remake - a remake that never happened. Code-named Condor, Malcolm disappears into the streets of Washington, hoping to evade the killers long enough to unravel the conspiracy - but will that be enough to save his life? First published in 1974, Six Days of the Condor became an instant classic conspiracy theory thriller. He contacts CIA headquarters for help but when an attempted rendezvous goes badly wrong he realises that no-one can be trusted. An automaton, he slowly turned and walked into Dr Lappe's office.' When Malcolm discovers his CIA colleagues butchered in the blood-spattered office he realises that only an oversight by the assassins has saved his life. A strange dullness came over Malcolm as he stared at the huddled flesh in the pool of blood. Her cigarette had dropped on her neck, singeing her flesh until the last millimetre of tobacco and paper had oxidized. The blast from the machine gun in the mailman's pouch had knocked her almost as far back as the coffee-pot. As usual, Mrs Russell had been standing behind her desk when they entered. Malcolm tossed the sandwich bags on top of Walter's desk and slowly mounted the stairs. Out of the corner of his eye he noticed that Dr. ![]() 'From the bottom of the stairwell Malcolm could only see that the room appeared to be empty.
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