Present were Betty, Colette, Linda, Marg and Michèle. We were a small group for this last meeting before September. The book this month is Operation Angus by Terry Fallis recommended by Linda. In honour of the main character Angus McLintock's native country Scotland, Michèle prepared smoked salmon served on homemade blinis, with a Scottish cheddar and a blue cheese quite popular in Scotland, and potato crisps made in Scotland. We also had Scottish scones with strawberries and cream.
Linda had contacted Terry Fallis and he generously agreed to participate in our meeting via FaceTime. He was very patient with us as we had some technical issues and his suggestions helped us get around them and still have a great conversation with him.
Terry Fallis is, of course, a Canadian author and he has written 8 novels. Operation Angus is the 3rd of a series beginning with The Best Laid Plans that we read in 2012 and The High Road published in 2010. All three novels relate the experiences of a mechanical engineering professor, Angus McLintock, originally from Scotland, who is elected to Parliament. Mr. Fallis has won several awards including twice the Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for Humour. He has an excellent website that can be accessed by clicking here Terry Fallis .
In Operation Angus, our main character Angus McLintock is now a junior Minister in the Liberal government and finds himself along with his Chief of Staff Daniel Addison in the middle of a clandestine spy operation to assassinate the President of Russia on Canadian soil.
As with the other novels we read, we all enjoyed the story and found it to be funny and quite the page turner, i.e.what else will happen? We did find that the suspense ended early in the story after the terrorist were apprehended. The last third of the book tied up loose ends, i.e.who was "Fleming" and what happened to her when MI6 found out she had gone rogue when her superiors refused to believe her about the assassination plot against the Russian President? How did our Canadian Prime Minister approach the British Prime Minister? Were Angus and Daniel properly recognized for stopping the Chechen terrorists? What was the connection between their friend Vivien, the former CSI agent and Fleming?
We had a very enjoyable conversation with Terry Fallis. We were able to ask questions about the plot and the characters. What was most interesting was our conversation about his writing process and even more important his new novel that he is presently writing. He was very generous with his time. We are looking forward to his new novel. Some of our members have read all of his books.
Thank you Linda for your book choice and especially for contacting Terry Fallis. Thanks to Terry Fallis for a very enjoyable conversation and his patience when we had technical issues with FaceTime .
Have a great summer everyone and we shall see you all, hopefully in person, in September.
