galloping hooves. Seconds later
MacKenzie Hawkins emerged on the dirt
road from beyond the trees and the
fields where only weeks ago maneuvers
were held. He reined in his horse and
trotted up to the northwest corner of
the gardens.
"Goddamn! Isn't it a glorious day?
You can see the peak of the
Matterhorn!"
There was the music of a triangle
calming from the other direction.
MacKenzie waved; Devereaux and Anne
turned 280
and saw Francesco on the terrace
outside the kitche door, the
triangle and the silver bar in his
hands. He w dressed in a large
apron, the Tyrolean hat firmly on h
head.
Zio Francesco called out.
"Lunch, everybody! The s''eciale
di giorno is fantast co!"
"I'm hungry as a horse!" roared
back the Hawk as patted his mount.
"What've you got, Zio?"
Francesco raised his voice to the
Alpine hills. And the, was music in
his words.
"My dear friends. It's Ling'`ini
Bo7nbalini!
291
,.,
LUDLUM
- ON
LUDLUM
Few writers have skyrocketed to popularity
with the speed of Robert Ludlum, with each
succeeding thriller becoming a bigger
bestseller. The key to his success may lie
in John Leonard's comment in The New York
Times, "Mr. Ludlum stuffs more surprises
into his novels than any other six-pack of
thriller writers combined."
Some people claim Ludlum has secret
sources for information found in his
stories. In one, an early book, a lrey
theme was CIA involvement in domestic
surveillance. At that time the subject
shocked many people. Later, of course,
this fact proved to be correct. Other
people suspect Ludlum was an agent himself
during the years prior to his career as a
novelist. Not true. For close to twenty
years he was in show business as an actor,
producer, and as the "voice" of dozens of
television commercials for products
ranging from Tiparillos to Tuna Helper.
During his "voice" period, Ludlum's wife
crowned him "King of the Toilet Bowls." As
he tells it, "there was this product
called Plunge. All I had to do was read
, ., ~1'
.~
three words: Plunge works fast. In spite
of my off-ean delivery, they used my
three words in over one hundre different
commercials. The money from this put one
my children through two years of
college."
Although none of Ludlum's novels draws
on his sho business background for
subject matter, they all refle'
techniques he learned in the theater.
Ludlum says, "tt theater man knows that
he must involve the audienc He
understands structure more than anyone
else I} lo~cal evolving of one event
into another event will out losing the
audience's attention. Because if you lo;
their interest, you're closing Saturday
night."
Ludlum admits, "I write primarily as an
entertains But I find that whether
you're writing comically
dramatically, you write from a point of
view of som thing that disturbs or
outrages you. And that's what do. I
admit to being outraged mostly by the
abu: of power by the fanatics. The
extremes bother me, rig or left." Yet he
adds, "I disapprove of violence, that
why I show pain for what it is. When my
characte get hit, they hurt. They don't
jump back into actic like John Wayne."
All of this and Moroccan be found in the
publishr work of Robert Ludlum. Since
his first novel, TH SCARLATTI
INHERITANCE, he has amassed ~ enviable
record of success: THE OSTERMAN WEE!
END, THE MATLOCK PAPERS, THE RHINt MANN
EXCHANGE, THE GEMINI CONTENT ERS; more
recently, THE CHANCELLOR MAN' SCRIPT,
THE HOLCROFT COVENANT, TO MATARESE
CIRCLE and THE BOURNS; IDE! TITY. His
latest bestseller, THE PARSIFAL MC SAIC,
will be published in paperback by Barton
1983~
.
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Robert Ludlum - Road To Gandolfo.txt Page 42