This was a pleasant read for a number of reasons.First, Eric Ambler is apparently considered by many espionage writers to be the founding father of the field. John le Carré (The Spy Who Came In from the Cold, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy) described him as "the source on which we all draw." Second, in 1935 he somehow took what little was publicly known about atomic theory and realized that E=Mc^2 indicated that a hypothetical "atomic bomb" would be massively destructive and politically destabilizing. So he decided to take the idea and write a "political thriller" about it. In his 1989 introduction, he wrote "In 1935 I knew, theoretically, that E probably equaled Mc^2, but could not quite accept the numerically awesome consequences of the equation. I mean, c^2, was such a huge and weird multiplier." So the device he conceived of as "a little larger than a Mills grenade" wasn't nearly as destructive as the multi-ton bomb actually manufactured. And, of course, he had to create the science behind his invention out of whole cloth, so it is quite anachronistic.And third, as an anachronism, a spy thriller from before World War II is a pleasant diversion from the complexities that have emerged since then, not the least of which is the nuclear specter he somewhat predicted.The fourth and final reason is the book itself: Ambler uses the tired plot device of amnesia in a delightful way -- perhaps it wasn't a cliche when he wrote this, but it still serves to reinforce the relative innocence of his time.This is a book that can be read in a single long evening, and I heartily recommend it.
Professore di fisica si crede James Bond e si comporta come tale. Una spy-story col sapore del bianco e nero alla domenica pomeriggio con arachidi, lupini e patatine. Troppo fumettistico per� e coi consueti Balcani d'epoca dove non mancano mai i Nanisha i Poveromovi? o i Stralounatou esperti delle classiche attivit� balcaniche: il cialtroning il complotting ed il velleitaring. Nonostante un corretto trattamento del traffico d'armi e la doverosa comparsa della misteriosa duchessa, vero mostro nicciano con tanto di discorso sintesi di "Genealogia della morale" for dummies, non si discosta dagli stereotipi. Colonna sonora The Clash - Sandinista! 2CD [c'� pero una cosa che in Ambler stupisce sempre. Scrive a met� degli anni '30 eppure che razza di bastardi fossero sovietici, nazisti, fascisti e imperialisti inglesi, l'aveva capito gi� benissimo, molto pi� di contemporanei che ancora si nascondono dietro formulette lise]
What do You think about The Dark Frontier (1991)?
Eric Ambler's first novel is fun, playful, energetic and absolutely revolutionary. This is the first brick in Ambler's wall of reinvention/creation for the espionage thriller. In this novel he predicted the might and seductory qualities of nuclear weapons and parodies the entire thriller genre at the same time. 'The Dark Frontier' also plays with the dual personality/reluctant hero theme as one of the principal narrators and the protagonist of the novel is a physicist who after suffering a brain injury ends up becoming an Über-spy. Anyway, not a superb thriller, but definitely the beginning of a great thriller career. The modern, literary spy novel owes everything to Eric Ambler's early risk taking.
—Darwin8u
Eric Ambler's career, famous for its reinvention of the spy genre, appropriately began with a spoof of the field. In this one, a physicist in need of a good vacation reads a bad thriller and after hitting his head in the course of a car accident, believes himself to be superspy Conway Carruthers – just before he is swept up in a genuine intrigue surrounding a nuclear weapons program in a small Balkan country.The premise is hokey, and a bit after the midpoint the story seemed to me to read more like the stories it was playing off of than a parody of them, but on the whole Dark Frontier holds up surprisingly well, long after many of the writers he parodied (like E. Phillips Oppenheim) have passed into obscurity.
—Nader Elhefnawy
