THE GLORY BOYS - Book review

Gerald Seymour’s The Glory Boys, published in 1976, was his second novel and is sadly still topical today. The Palestine Liberation Organisation has despatched three men to London to kill David Sokarev, an Israeli nuclear scientist who is visiting to give a lecture. The PLO’s purpose is to make a statement and instil fear. Two of the men are intercepted by Israeli Intelligence; only one, Abd-El-Famy, escapes.

Famy is untried but determined to continue with the assassination attempt: ‘... his enemy, tired now, outdated, unable to compete in the new and modern world that he was seeking, unable to comprehend the hitting power of the Palestinian movement, unable to defend itself against the new philosophy of revolution and attack’ (p67).

As planned, Famy obtains the assistance of McCoy, a Provisional IRA killer, who is to supply the weapons.

Alerted that there was a third PLO man hell-bent on assassination, the Security Service attempts to locate the Arab before he can fulfil his mission, and surprisingly they use an old drunk, Jimmy, as the trigger-man; indeed, he may like his tipple too much, but he was a damned good shot and a cold-blooded experienced killer.

A tense man-hunt is under way, involving several innocent women as well.

 

Even though the world has moved on since this book was written, becoming more hi-tech, there’s no denying the narrative power of Seymour’s story. As ever, he gets into the skin of the protagonists and it reads like it really happened and it still grips the reader.