The Gibraltar Factor

Veering from adventure to political drama to pop psychology, the plot of this thriller seems slightly addled at best. Jake Melrose, an ex-Marine captain doing low-level security work, is asked by the CIA's London station head to check up on Billy Vane, a former SAS man who has some damning information on the British defense minister, Freddie Godber. Through the intercession of die-hard Falangists and an Irish Protestant terrorist, Godber plans to set up Spain as a military threat to Britain, then use the defense ministry's decisive ``response'' as a springboard into 10 Downing St. Meanwhile, the station head is killed, the mutually mistrustful Melrose and Vane team up, and Melrose develops a romantic interest in a woman admired by Vane--and married to Godber's private secretary. The violence here seems arbitrary and the writing can be laughable: ``There was a lean and hungry look about Madrid.'' Hunter ( The Kremlin Armoury ) served in the RAF and the British civil service and clearly knows something of parliamentary politics, but he is out of his depth with things American, particularly the dialect; among other glaring errors, the Ivy League CIA types all say ``ain't.'' (Apr.)