Re: Last Book Read...
The Island Where Time Stands Still
Dennis Wheatley
the 8th volume of the Gregory Sallust series, from 1954....
In regards to prototypical Bond elements:
this may of course be coincidence, but Gregory washes up on the Pacific island after losing his wife. At first, the islanders' reaction to his discovery of their secret is to offer him an amnesia drug, wiping away all memories and personality. He actually prefers this solution, as his grief is so painful he would prefer to forget all, and live out his days in anonymity and seclusion on the isle.
Does the death of a wife, a Pacific island, and amnesia sound familiar?
Yes, no doubt at all. I enjoyed this one a lot but I'd rather hold off discussing it till you've read the next (and last) one "The White Witch Of The South Seas" to avoid spoilers.
It'll be a while til I get to The White Witch Of The South Seas, Barbel, the only other Sallust adventure I was able to find is They Used Dark Forces, which is next on my reading list.
Just glancing at wikipedia, it looks like Wheatley skips backwards in the timeline for that one, back to WWII. But it was written 1964.
There was a page I found a couple weeks ago, that lists the Sallust books in order of internal chronology, as well as publication order. It's not just that Black August happens after all the others, they all skipped back and forth in the timeline (like Conan and Flashman both did).
Can't seem to find that page now, if I can I'll link to it later, because it's a good resource.
