The Eleventh Commandment- Jeffrey Archer

Welcome to Archer’s world of Espionage is a little different from that of Fredrick Forsyth’s. First published some nineteen years ago, Archer’s “ The Eleventh Commandment” could be said to be a mix of Archer’s gripping storytelling and Forsyth inspired Espionage detailing, how things here are a little bit on the personal side as the main protagonist, Connor Fitzgerald itself is on firing line and this he has play the game with his own boss.

It would surely come as a surprise to many a readers that Archer would try his hand in espionage and Inter country surveillances, but if we look into the depth of the basic plot, it has the Archer trademark, of a clash between Good and Evil. Interestingly enough, the evil portions, i.e. the antagonist is a female, a very shrewd female.

Archer has his trademark of dividing his plot into cluster of years and bifurcating the same, however in this book, the plot is divided into four sections which are not any cluster of years, but could be referred to as the various character angles the protagonist gets into through the entire plot, namely the plot is divided into “The team player”, “The Loner”, “The hired Assassin” and “The Quick and the dead”.

There are some great twists and turn throughout the narrative and the berry on the cake could be said to be finale chapter. It comes out really very well, though hardcore Archer fans would have guessed what was coming. This is one of those stories, where in Archer has kept Britain away from the main plot, it basically deals with USA and Russia.

Like Archer’s other books, this too has a strong negative character but this time, the actions have been kept behind the scenes.  What it also makes us think is about the basic difference in treatment of plots by Archer and Forsyth. It is really interesting to note the difference, which comes out in this book very well, both are great story tellers and both have different form of telling a story. It really will be very interesting to read the same plot, if written by Forsyth.

Also what is noteworthy, is the beautiful narrative about the family moments and the emotions, which the characters have for each other. It makes us feel and also think about the lives which the families of secret agents must have lived and still living.

“The Eleventh Commandment” is an interesting read, primarily, due to the Author’s attempt to cover both Espionage and Good versus Evil clash within the same story at different angles and towards different characters.