The Lifeline

The Lifeline is a book by the splendidly-named Phyllis Bottome that was first printed in 1946. The author and her husband ,former MI6 officer Ernan Forbes Dennis ,ran an experimental school in Austria whose most famous pupil was a young Ian Fleming and it's been said that The Lifeline and it's main character Mark Chalmers in particular were the inspiration for his James Bond books.

In 1938 Chalmers is a teacher at Eton who is asked to do a friend from the Foreign Office a favour for British Intelligence and pass on information to an agent in Nazi-occupied Austria. Once there Chalmers finds himself increasingly involved in intelligence work and taking on more and more risky assignments.

I was particularly interested to read this book as I recently read some of the early Bond books so I was eager to compare.
Well there are similarities in the main characters but this is superbly-written and far from the pulp fiction that is the reality of the first 007 books. Chalmers is cultured,a deep thinker and a very humane and insightful man, the early Bond isn't much more than a brutal thug with his brains below his beltline. Fleming never wrote prose like this, he wrote books,this is literature.

There are places where the speech is dated,and there is the odd word that wouldn't be used now,for example the inhabitants of a psychiatric hospital being referred to routinely as "idiots", that's hardly surprising in a book written 80 years ago. Aside from that,and characters occasionally "speechifying" as James Lee Burke calls it,it still holds up well as a great piece of writing and I'd love to read more of Phyliss Bottome's work.

This book can definitely be enjoyed on its own merits. It is a reissue of a title by this author who is credited with teaching quite a lot to Ian Fleming. Here she tells her own thrilling tale of espionage and derring do.

The story takes place in 1938 at a difficult time in the world. A schoolmaster is recruited by the Foreign Office and accepts an assignment. How will he fare? find out in this good read.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Muswell Press for this title. All opinions are my own.

Reader reviews compelled me to explore this piece by Phyllis Bottome, and I was not disappointed. While the narrative's second half veered into more melancholic and emotional territory, a departure from Fleming's Bond - unless one considers Daniel Craig's portrayal, which delves into Bond's emotional depths - it offered a refreshing depth to the character dynamics.

Mark Chalmers is not your typical spy; he never envisioned himself in espionage until his friend Roger enlisted him as a messenger. What starts as a seemingly routine task of delivering a message in exchange for a fully-paid vacation to Austria evolves into a profound journey of personal and moral reckoning.

The backdrop of Nazi rule in Austria adds layers of complexity to Chalmers' mission. His admission to a mental hospital under the guise of a patient, in order to act as a messenger for a British agent, thrusts him into a world of uncertainty and danger.

While the pacing occasionally felt sluggish, the overall narrative exceeded my expectations. The Lifeline is a testament to Bottome's skill as a writer, offering a captivating blend of espionage, moral dilemmas, and human connection.

The premise of this book is that an Eton teacher is made a reluctant spy while on holiday in Austria. He is asked to return to Austria and to report back what he sees the Germans doing towards the war. However, I feel like this was less of a spy novel and more about a man who has a particular belief system, and code of conduct but begins to question these concepts as he encounters danger and meets different kinds of people who risk their lives to assist him. He learns much about himself, his emotions, and whether or not he can fit this “new” knowledge in with the person he was before. It was an engrossing story with vivid imagery of people and places.

Father Martin said “… Beyond all expression, what they do is horrible. Such evil is still, for those in more fortunate lands, unimaginable. Yet even in days when there were no Nazis, such evil existed; and men would not believe it, because that they did not care to alter what was evil. It cost too much. What we now see - because the Nazis have so plainly shown it to us on a large scale - is the cause of this evil. Evil is made out of the refusal to love our neighbor as ourselves. You have looked at the naked face of it, for it is hate that Hitler has taught the whole of the German nation, and it is not surprising that you were shaken by it.”

Bond before there was Bond.

"The Lifeline" opens in 1938 where Mark Chalmers is a teacher at Eton. He is asked to do a favour for a friend from the Foreign Office, on behalf of British Intelligence, and pass information to an agent in Nazi-occupied Austria. He agrees, and is parachuted in. But once there, despite having no intention of committing himself beyond this one job, finds himself involved in further acts of espionage and spying, fighting with the Austrian-German Underground. What follows is a series of action-packed adventures and near escapes. Written just after the end of WW2, this book must have had a profound impact on readers, and still does so eight years later.

Those new to Phyllis Bottome may well be drawn to her books because of comparisons to Fleming's Bond books, and the idea that he based Bond on her character. It's no surprise - Chalmers is 36, dark haired, athletic, a proficient skier and sportsman, speaks fluent French and German and has a taste for wine, food and women. That's Bond. And, of course, Fleming studied under Bottome at her school in Austria. But that doesn't detract from the originality and power of her writing. And The Lifeline is her only proper spy novel.

The book is clearly a product of its time - and I was pleased to see that little revising or editing has been made to the text. Those approaching the works of Bottome, like any other writer of the early 20th Century should be prepared to enjoy and tolerate the language of the time. It reflects both the attitudes and the nuances of that period, and is part of the enjoyment for me. We can only hope more of her wonderful stories are made available to a new audience.