The Antagonists

London: Cassell & Co, 1964. 1st thus. hardback. Very good, 1st edition thus (originally in 1963), with clipped d/j in protective sleeve; blue clothbound boards clean with bright gilt titling on spine. Pages crisp, unmarked and tightly bound. A little foxing on edges.. 8vo: crown (200 x 140 / 8"" x 5_""). The sixth of 21 books involving William Haggard's protagonist Colonel Charles Russell, the urbane head of the unobtrusive but lethal Security Executive, a government counter-intelligence agency clearly based on the actual MI5 or Security Service, where he moves easily and gracefully along C.P. Snow's Corridors of Power in Whitehall. Like Haggard's earlier books it has standard elements of suspense thrillers along with detailed examinations of character, but in this case with more scenes of direct action and somewhat less dissection of character and motivation than in the first three books. Julian Symons wrote, ""Of our three post-Amber thriller writers, Fleming Deighton and Haggard, probably it is Mr Haggard who best conveys the peculiar atmosphere of public school gentility blended with unreasonable violence in which security work is actually carried out. The whole thing is done with beautiful smoothness.""