Intrigue in Paris

Sometimes I just need to hit the pulp fiction shelf, and this enjoyable thriller filled the bill just fine. A couple of years after World War 2, American merchant marine Wright Hughey is sitting in an outdoor cafe in Marseilles, waiting out a tugboat strike, when he is mistaken for a local criminal by some other criminals. intrigue ensues! Although the plot of this romp becomes steadily less plausible as it goes along, nevertheless it is a good time for readers who go in for this sort of thing. Noel was a pretty writer, the action scenes themselves are believable and never get out of hand, and overall the action is understated rather than lurid. I looked up Noel, and it turns out he wrote several of these thrillers and a couple of show more science fiction works as well.

There is a 1956 English movie based on the book, called "House of Secrets:" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Secrets_(1956_film) (Warning: if you look at this web page, don't read the plot synopsis, as it contains spoilers for the book. That's if you think you will ever read the book, of course.) show less