Posted by Peter H on February 28, 2008 at 20:20:49 from 86.154.105.236 user Peter_H.
In Reply to: Re: The Missionaries posted by Adam Quinan on February 28, 2008 at 17:05:13:
PP and P&M lie somewhere in the middle of the range
Oh how different we all are! For me, PP soars magisterially high above the other books (good as they are) - it grabs you from the very first line with the porter's shouts and doesn't let you down one inch until the last. There is a passage in it of three short sentences which for me sums up the essence of Ransome's genius:-
This is just brilliant - you can see that bike, and how many other writers would have thrown in that short comment "The front wheel was still spinning"? - a lovely little observed detail that contains within it the desperate urgency of the plot at that point.