Malko 8: Death on the River Kwai

SAS L’Or de la Rivière Kwai, published in French in 1971, is one of just a handful of the 200 hugely popular Malko novels written by French former newspaper reporter Gérard de Villiers to be translated into English. That English edition, Malko 8: Death on the River Kwai, came out in 1975.

The hero of this spy series is His Serene Highness Prince Malko Ligne, Count of the Holy Roman Empire, Knight of the Black Eagle, Knight of the Order of Landgrave Seraphim of Kletgaus, Knight of the Order of Malta. This Austrian prince works for the CIA. He does it for the money. He owns a castle and castles cost a fortune to maintain. Despite his mercenary motivations the CIA regards him as absolutely reliable.

The jobs he does for the CIA are the tricky ones that require a certain amount of flair. They can at times be a bit morally murky.

He’s currently in Thailand investigating the disappearance of his espionage mentor Jim Stanford. Stanford is retired from the CIA but spies can never really retire. Their pasts are always likely to catch up to them. Stanford may have been killed or he may have been abducted. And, oddly enough, back in the States his sister is murdered.

The local CIA station chief has given Malko an assistant - his pretty Thai secretary (who turns out to be from an incredibly rich family). Tepin is efficient and helpful. She is a virgin. She makes sure that Malko knows this. Tepin intends to defend her virtue. On the other hand she can’t help noticing that Malko is terribly brave and handsome and he has such sexy eyes. But she’s a good girl.

There are plenty of leads but they just leave Malko more bewildered. Stanford had a beautiful Thai wife, a thriving silk business, a luxurious house and an impressive art collection. But clearly he had secrets. His wife is not saying anything. Her attitude is puzzling and she seems just a little scared.

He discovers that Stanford was a regular customer at a Bangkok massage parlour where he got special favours (very special) from a very cute masseuse. Malko gets the same treatment from her and he can well understand why Stanford was such a loyal customer. She introduces Malko to pleasures he had never even imagined.

Stanford also has a mistress, a Chinese singer/whore. Malko doesn’t get much useful information from her but she teaches him a thing or two as well. Malko finds that the most effective place to interrogate pretty female witnesses is in bed. Even if they don’t reveal useful information the interrogations are still rewarding.

The problem is that while he now knows that Jim Stanford was no Boy Scout none of this offers Malko any clues as to why someone would want to liquidate or kidnap him. Stanford chased women but there are no indications that he was mixed up in anything political. On the other hand, taking into account that his sister was targeted as well, he had to have been involved in something big and something sinister.

Meanwhile Tepin is starting to reconsider this whole defending her virginity thing.

A major strength of this novel is the female characters. They are of course dangerous and sexy but they also have complex and believably feminine motivations. Malko is smart enough to know that one of these women is the key to the mystery but he has no idea which of them it might be.

And after he’s been beaten up several times he’s sure he must be getting close to some answers.

Malko has a tendency to be careless. He gets himself into scrapes that could have been avoided. It’s not that he isn’t a good intelligence agent, but he is not an infallible super-spy.

There’s plenty of action, there’s a well-crafted plot with effective twists, there’s an exotic setting and there are those beautiful dangerous women. It all adds up to a fine spy thriller and it’s highly recommended.

I’ve reviewed five of the other English-translated Malko books - West of Jerusalem, Operation New York, Man from Kabul, Malko versus the CIA and Malko: Angel of Vengence. They're all very much worth reading.