The Last Frontier

I had expected a spy thriller in which intelligence and courage of spy hero unvails the scoundrels. This book contains only providential coincidence ,totally unnatural incidents. Many pages bores with advocating pro & cons of a partcular ism of political govrnance of a country. Mere waste of time. Not like Aliester Macleans

Reynolds the super hero spy and the Count overshadow everyone else in the story. Their indestructible nature is a little incredible. A little too much of philosophical dialogues make the book drag on at times. Otherwise compulsive reading cover to cover.

Well researched. Good pace once it picks up.Great creation of characters.Relaxed read without too much complexity.I read a Maclean after 20 years. Will restart the series.

How can one rate a novel? It is so personal - I love Alistair Maclean's "icy" thrillers, like "The Last Frontier" ("Ice Station Zebra", "Night Without End" are others). The plot is a superb one, with espionage, torture, political philosophy and daring-do in the early years of the Cold War. But these are very old novels from the 50's and 60's, and it was a pleasure to re-discover them in a neat and tidy paperback binding. Now they'll rest in my locked bookcase (to prevent them from "walking away" like my previous ones) until my grandchildren, perhaps, come across them in future decades (even I might re-read favourite passages from time to time, so brilliant and gripping do I find Maclean's writing)!

Amazing novelRelentlessly action packedThe gasping chilling cold war eraAnd a man on a mission

This is trademark Alistair MacLean.Michael Reynolds is a British intelligence and whose mission is to get behind the Iron Curtain and into communist Hungary and get a noted scientist out before . It is the middle of a bitingly cold winter and our protagonist is caught almost immediately after getting there.From there start the twists, turns, the agents, the double-agents, and a race against time.However, without giving away spoilers, there is less here than some other famous AM novels. The hero is a cliched cardboard cutout figure, the narrative sometimes didactic, and some scenes that go on for pages where nothing happens or threatens to happen.

Though a little filmy it kept me on my nerves. What English. The words & description leaves one spellbound. Loved every moment of reading.

Kindle edition of this book has made it easier to read and store. I am building up my library once again. Alistair Maclean at his best.

This particular book is far from his best, very "wordy", and (not neccessarily his fault) dated. The author never seems to use one word, if he can get away with five more. Almost like he is trying to demonstrate his "skills". Caravan to Vaccares and this demonstrate McLean to his worst advantage, stories easy to put down, too predictable characters so poorly scripted as to be incredulous, both of these titles have you turning the pages, not to discover the rest of the story, rather to get you closer to the end. Rather tedious, formulaic novel writing to fulfill a contract obligation, rather than joyfully entertain a reader!.Mundane at best.This is a book you can say you have read, but not one fiction lovers will urge others to read. Disappointing.

In this early effort, Alistair MacLean hits the ground running with a very suspense-filled story, told in the first person, of a lone British agent's perilous mission behind the Iron Curtain (Hungary, to be precise), where the Cold War is very chilly indeed. There is quite a range of memorable characters, plus plenty of twists and turns as you'd expect from this master storyteller."The Last Frotier" doesn't seem to be as well known as MacLean's later novels such as "The Guns of Navarone", Where Eagles Dare", and "When Eight Bells Toll". In part this may because the film - yes, there is one, called "The Secret Ways" - is very obscure, unlike the films of the aforementioned titles. However, if you enjoy this author's other books, you are almost certain to find this one a real page-turner.

This may be old in terms of the political situation represented - although I've never seen why that should be a problem. Countries are built on their historical foundations and literature is one way of learning about other places, different attitudes. The characters are no less compelling because of the era in which it is set, and it has some wonderful flashes of humour in it as well as action. Then there are the descriptions of extreme cold, a theme in many of MacLean's stories.I was fortunate enough to be given the first couple of paragraphs in my German A'level to translate from German into English. I wish I could say that this helped me to earn an A grade, but alas ... However, I didn't fail. This needs to be available on audio too - text to speech just isn't right.

This is a compelling work of fiction, so compelling that one doubts that it is, although, if such a story were true it would certainly more than eclipse the exploits of James Bond. The plot of the story is that of a British secret service agent rescuing a British scientist who defected to the Soviets in Hungary during the Cold War. The naiveté of the scientist as to matters outside his expertise contrasts with the realism of the professional agent focused on the job, namely the scientist's rescue. From the start the agent's job is impossible and seemingly becomes more desperate as we read on. Yet against all the odds; being captured twice by a ruthless totalitarian secret police, escaping and then rescuing the scientist from their clutches, and finally being entrapped again exceeds the imagination.This is one of those books you have to keep reading if only to find out what happened to the hero and whether his mission was a success against all odds. If the hero's story were true then Captain Michael Reynolds of the British Secret Service would indeed be a legend of our times.

This was never one of MacLean's most lauded books but I remember reading it when it first came out and shivering at its portrait of a totalitarian country. Rereading it in 2018 I find it gives a clear warning about how easily morality submits to expediency.