JUDGMENT ON DELTCHEV - Book review


Eric Ambler’s novel Judgment on Deltchev was published in 1951.

It’s narrated in the first person by Foster, an English playwright who is co-opted by an American newspaper to be a journalist for a series of articles on the show trial of Yordan Deltchev, an Eastern European ‘hero of the people’.

Foster is met at the railway station by his employer’s local representative, Georghi Pashik, a man he takes an instant dislike to; Pashik is a cautious man and doesn’t want Foster to cause any trouble for the new regime.

Quite frequently, Ambler provides hints about hovering doom nearby, whether that’s relating to a character’s ultimate death, or some of Foster’s actions which he considers foolish in retrospect.

Ambler succeeds in revealing the oppressive nature of the unnamed Communist state. Indeed, it is believed he based his book on the show trial of the Bulgarian politician Nikola Petkov. This byzantine story, the true nature of Pashik, and the repercussions of Foster’s meddling provide the reader with a complex political plot, inhabited by fascinating characters, suspense, action and tragedy.

Considered one of Ambler’s best novels.

Ambler died in 1998, aged 89.

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