The first part of this latest adventure of cowardly killer Boysie Oakes [Madrigal] is charming, with pretty send-ups of Len Deighton plus a touch of Bond, yet missing the usual fault of send-ups—insufficient plot. But by the second half Boysie has found manhood and we are in another kind of thriller. Both are above par, but they don't quite jell. And where does newly bold Boysie go from here?

"Criminiscule," in The Times Literary Supplement, No. 3420, September 14, 1967, p. 824.∗