Peter O’Donnell’s I, Lucifer (Modesty Blaise #3)

I, Lucifer was the third of Peter O’Donnell’s Modesty Blaise novels. It appeared in 1967.

Modesty Blaise of course started life as a comic strip character, created by O’Donnell in 1963. He was hired to write the screenplay for the Modesty Blaise movie, which ended up not being used for the movie. But even before the movie was released O’Donnell had produced a novelisation of the screenplay which was published in 1965 as Modesty Blaise and was hugely successful (in fact a lot more successful than the movie).

O’Donnell eventually wrote eleven Modesty Blaise novels plus two short story collections, while continuing to write the comic strip.

Modesty Blaise was certainly not the first kickass action heroine. Honey West predates her by several years - the first Honey West novel, This Girl for Hire, appeared in 1956. And by the time the Modesty Blaise comic was launched Cathy Gale had already exploded onto the small screen in The Avengers.

What made Modesty Blaise so intriguing is that she was not just a kickass action heroine. She also belonged to the tradition of the gentleman rogue hero. The most famous such hero is of course Leslie Charteris’s Simon Templar, the Saint. The Saint had several precursors and lots of imitators. What makes Modesty Blaise so very interesting is that she was not just the first lady rogue acton heroine, she is still just about the only representative of that species.

And Modesty has a great deal in common with Simon Templar. Both became exceedingly rich by being very successful criminals. Both more or less retired from crime to become crime-fighters. Both have worked unofficially for the British intelligence services. Both occupy a socially ambiguous position. Simon Templar can pass as a gentleman but he isn’t really one. Modesty can pass as a lady but she isn’t really one. They are able to move in the highest social circles but they remain outsiders. Both are charming, sexy and dangerous. Both tend not to worry too much about conforming to conventional standards of morality. Both have a definite streak of ruthlessness. Both are unapologetic about their criminal pasts. Modesty Blaise is to a large extent a female Simon Templar.

The adventure with which I, Lucifer is concerned isn’t really Modesty’s business, but she makes it her business (which is exactly Simon Templar’s approach to life). Someone tries to kill a friend of hers, a man highly placed in the French intelligence community. Modesty tends to get annoyed by that sort of thing. She has a word to Sir Gerald Tarrant, a man very highly placed in a British counter-espionage agency for whom she often works totally unofficially. And she discovers that something very strange is going on. Someone is running a protection racket, but an unusual one. Those who don’t pay up die, but they die of natural causes.

The reader already knows that Lucifer has something to do with his. No, not that Lucifer, the real one, but a very disturbed young man who is convinced that he is Lucifer. He has a very unusual ability, which eventually explains how that unconventional protection racket is worked. That ability possessed by the young man is being used by a criminal mastermind.

Modesty and her partner-in-crime (now her partner in crimefighting) Willie Garvin finally manage to infiltrate this criminal organisation and a great deal of mayhem ensues. There are quite a few complications. Modesty has been having a rather pleasant love affair with a young fellow named Stephen. Stephen is a bit of an innocent and somehow he has become involved in this criminal conspiracy.

This novel deals with the paranormal, in this case precognition. You do have to remember that this was 1967, a time when the paranormal was still moderately scientifically respectable. The paranormal was not a concept that was confined merely to genres like science fiction and fantasy. It would pop up from time to time in spy fiction. In fact at that time some of the crazier real-life intelligence agencies such as the C.I.A. took things like telepathy quite seriously.

And this paranormal aspect is used quite skilfully. The way the protection racket works is clever. The paranormal powers possessed by Lucifer have serious limits. They do not make him invulnerable nor do they make the criminal gag unbeatable. That’s normally the biggest single disadvantage of magic, super-powers or paranormal powers in fiction - they make either the hero or the villain seem too formidable.

And Lucifer is an intriguing charter. He’s a nice young man who just happens to believe that he is the Prince of Darkness. Modesty rather likes him.

During the course of this case Modesty will have to consider whether she’s prepared to (literally) get into bed with the Devil. She decides that she’s done worse things, and he is very good-looking.

The novel doesn’t stint when it comes to action. If you want unarmed combat, gunplay, knife fights and explosions you’ll be well satisfied. There are sinister insane villains (who are much more sinister and insane than Lucifer).

And then there are Pluto and Belial, and they add another touch of outrageousness to the story.

There’s no graphic sex but there’s a casual acceptance of the idea that people do have sex. Modesty likes sex. She’s by no means obsessed with it, but she does enjoy it.

Like the two earlier novels in the series I, Lucifer is clever, witty and great fun. Highly recommended.