Miles Tripp's last book appeared as recently (in relative terms) as 1999 and he died the following year. In his day, he was a highly regarded writer, if not a stellar name. But I think it's fair to say that he really is a forgotten author. But I've always found his books interesting and well-written, even if sometimes they reveal a lack of interest in plot that is disconcerting.
Kilo Forty (1963), one of his earliest novels, is regarded in some quarters as his best. I first heard of it when it was included in the 'Curiosities and Singletons' section of the first edition of Julian Symons' Bloody Murder. He said: 'All of the books written by Miles Tripp...under his own name (he has written some commonplace thrillers as John Michael Brett) are about people whose nerve-ends are showing, but Kilo Forty...is outstanding amongst them, a psychological study of the emotional conflicts between four people on holiday by the Red Sea, which explodes into savage violence. There is a touch of Simenon, some similarity to Highsmith, but a sort of tortured veracity runs through the story that is conspicuously Tripp's own.'
Alas, in later editions of the book, Symons did not mention Tripp at all. Perhaps he was disappointed by the later novels; I don't know. At all events, this rather reflected the steady decline of Tripp's reputation as a cutting-edge crime writer. Symons' summary of the novel is spot on, but I wouldn't say that this is an outstanding book, nor even as good as some of the other Tripp books that I've read.
I felt there was a certain waywardness about the way the ingredients of the story were put together. The prose is taut, with no padding, and the unusual setting is well-evoked; Tripp wisely resists the temptation to indulge in a travelogue. But I didn't warm to the characters and the way they behaved towards each other wasn't as compelling as it should have been. So, a bit of a disappointment, given that I had high expectations.
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