The Loo Sanction by Trevanian
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
I have just finished reading, literally seconds ago, The Loo Sanction.
I thought I had read this once before. But I didn’t remember any of it. Then again, my reading of it must have been nearly twenty years ago. Let’s call it a kind of pseudo-Alzheimer’s. And the joke is that it would be great to get Alzheimer’s and go reread all of one’s favorite books for the first time. I’m living the dream, here in my foggy head.
I read somewhere that The Eiger Sanction was supposed to be a spoof, but nobody got it. So this novel, it’s sequel, is supposed to up the ante.
In my review of The Eiger Sanction, I pointed out that Trevanian had used the word “insouciance.” Twice. However, in the Loo Sanction, he only uses the word once. So don’t know how we’re expected to feel the bash of the brick with which he’s allegedly hitting us on the head. Then again, he does go to great pains, when describing a nude woman’s woman parts, to use the word “ecu” repeatedly. I’m assuming it’s French.
No other word would do in this, a “thriller” that written as if the writer knows he should write literature but he’s deigning to entertain us for a few hundred pages instead. Not unlike the main character, who deigns to give lectures on art in between moments of daring-do, escapades, shenanigans. And in Britain no less. One wonder what escapades Travanian himself got up to when he wasn’t bearing the odious burden of using his amazing intellect to write pulp fiction.
In another twenty years I may read this book again. I may have for real Alzheimer’s. I may think I am reading my own biography. Not because I ever killed for the government, co-mingled with art thieves, or made vigorous love to acrobatic women. No, it will my recall of all the big words I like to throw around on account of how smart I am. You’ll see.