So I can’t say I know very much about Eric Ambler, other than to say that he and his career are sort of contemporaneous with someone like Raymond Chandler. He is most well know for crime fiction and mysteries, spy novels, and international suspense tales. He’s also one of those interesting writers who joined up the war effort and had a successful service career, becoming a Lt. Colonel. He’s also the author of several novels that were adapted to films — Journey into Fear starring Orson Welles being a famous one, as well as Topkapi starring Peter Ustinov (for which he won an Oscar).
Like other books, this one has a different title from the US to the UK editions. The UK one is better and more connected to the novel’s plot, but I can understand the shift as well, as the American one is more sharp.
The Mask for Dimitrios or A Coffin for Dimitrios is about mystery novelist who is asked by the Turkish police to help witness and then investigate a murder of an infamous criminal conspirator wanted for murder, but who has also turned up dead in Turkey.
The novel then goes along with Latimer as her takes the notes from the Turkish police and traces the criminal history and personal history of Dimitrios. I found the novel to be very suspenseful and I read it in two sittings (with only a brief tv break in the middle) and I was completely compelled and at one late twist I felt viscerally excited to move forward.
The style and tone are also compelling. The style is relatively police procedural, with an investigation of the documents and interviews and records as Latimer reads them, and the tone is very matter of fact, but with a sense of irony. There’s also a good amount of action too.
(Photo: https://www.amazon.com/Coffin-Dimitrios-Eric-Ambler/dp/0375726713/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1556984592&sr=1-1)
