Alec Marsh's 'After the Flood' 2024

Sharpe Books first paperback edition - 2024

This is the fourth outing for Professor Ernest Drabble and his dipsomaniac hanger-on Percival Harris. This time they are accompanied by Drabble's new wife, Charlotte - who readers of the last escapade will recall. In fact, the Drabbles are on their honeymoon; both Charlotte and this reader would have preferred it if Harris had not been tagging along. However, all the qualities of Alec Marsh's previous thrillers are here - well-researched background (both historically and geographically) conveys the atmosphere of the Istanbul of Atatürk just before the Second World War.  There is a febrile encounter at the famous Hagia Sophia, followed by a break-in at Harris' room back at the hotel. The latter has gone AWOL (in the arms of Yasmin Yildiz, a Turkish woman working for a clandestine group) and, worse, Charlotte also disappears. This is but the beginning of all three of our intrepid honeymooners being drawn into a rather bewildering conspiracy. 

At its heart is a Turkish nationalist general's plan to uncover Noah's Ark from the upper region of Mount Ararat. General Sivilogu wishes to use this discovery to support the return of His Imperial Majesty, Sultan Adbulmejid II  to the Ottoman throne. Atatürk is known to be dying, so Sivilogu aims to exploit the inevitable ensuing power vacuum on behalf of the Sultan. He is supported by a Nazi group led by Major Hauptman and his side kick Captain Bloch, who wish to use the discovery of the Ark for the greater glory of their Führer. There is also another figure working for the same purpose on behalf of Comrade Stalin. Drabble is forcibly made to join Sivilogu's and Hauptman's expedition to the snowy region of Ararat, where he is to use his professorial expertise to prove that any structure found beneath the ice is, in fact, Noah's Ark. Good luck, Carruthers! The author skilfully immixes the various components of the tale - Charlotte's attempts to break out from her confinement; Drabble's inability to escape from duress; Harris' sozzled pursuit of Sivilogu's party. It's all good fun.

However,  the small 'curate's egg' feeling I had from the previous tales, grew somewhat this time. From first to last Harris is either drinking, smoking or being a coward. He also enjoys rutting, although why any sensible female would pursue this escapade with him is hard to comprehend. As early as page 4, he is sitting in his railway cabin pouring himself a broad whisky...next he fished out his pipe and prepared it. By page 15, Harris had taken the top off his first sidecar (basically a Margarita or White Lady with Cognac as its base) of the day and was contemplating lining up a second. He is soon at the  hotel bar and on to his second, then a third. He only slows down as the afternoon tipple might yet knock on into predinner sharpeners... He then gets semi-kidnapped by the girl - his romps in life are usually the result of the fairer sex having ulterior/nefarious designs - and finally meets up with Drabble, haggard but happy...with watery eyes. No wonder an irritated Drabble tells Harris to go and have a drink. Get whammed. That'll help. His vaunting self regard accompanies him through most of his life, except when cowardice takes over. Not for the first time in the series, Harris is captured (with a sack over his head) and subject to torture. His response, once left alone, is to chain-smoke Craven A cigarettes. And so it goes on throughout the book; whenever the author turns to Harris one feels it is with contempt. Did he know someone like Harris in real life?! Quite frankly, the tale would not have lost anything if Harris had stayed at home in England. In fact, I feel it would have been sharper. If there is to be a fifth story, can I plead for 'An Ernest and Charlotte Drabble Thriller'.                                                                                                                                                          

The novel deserves a better level of proofreading. I put a pencilled asterisk in the margin every time I spotted an error and there were far too many. Moreover, I am not sure if it was the proof reader or the printer (Amazon), but there were also too many instances of sentences being truncated on one line and then continuing on the next one.