RogerBW's Blog

Paul Temple and the Sullivan Mystery 19 September 2023

2006 remount of the 1947 audio thriller by Francis Durbridge, in 8 parts. Paul and Steve are asked to take a pair of spectacles with them on their trip to Cairo…

It's a classic MacGuffin, of course - the significance of the glasses isn't revealed until the final episode. Mostly this is good old-fashioned shenanigans, with a variety of people turning up and mostly being friendly but then turning out to be up to no good. Several people get murdered by various means, and – I think a first in my listening to this series – a foreigner turns out to be a good guy. (Well, he is the chief of police in Cairo, so maybe police = good takes precedence over foreigner = bad.)

But there's enjoyable period detail, and some more active female characters than usual. I enjoyed this more than some of them simply because of how silly it all is. (Though the MacGuffin turns out to be actually plausible.)

"After the customs and the currency check-up, they take us out to the flying-boat."

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