Quote:
Originally Posted by GA Russell
bf, I'm planning to read Riddle soon. But when The 39 Steps was the book club's selection, it was discussed as if it was the first modern spy thriller. Are you confident that Riddle rather than 39 Steps was the one?
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Yes, John Buchan was supposedly strongly influenced by The Riddle of the Sands.
Childers was no stranger to the twilight world. Although his Irish background was of the Protestant Ascendency and he was an Establishment insider (he was Clerk of Petitions), he sided with the Republicans. He ran a cargo of rifles into Ireland in June 1914 (supposedly used in the 1916 Easter Rising). He wound up on the wrong side in the Irish Civil War and was executed by firing squad in 1921, after a rushed military trial.