Circus (novel)

For other meanings of "Circus", see Circus.

Circus
cover of paperback edition published by Fawcett Crest
Author(s)	Alistair MacLean
Country	United Kingdom
Language	English
Genre(s)	Spy Novel Thriller novel
Publisher	Collins
Publication date	1975
Media type	Print (Hardcover)
ISBN	NA
Preceded by	Breakheart Pass
Followed by	The Golden Gate

Circus is a novel written by the Scottish author Alistair MacLean. It was first released in the United Kingdom by Collins in 1975 and later in the same year by Doubleday in the United States.

Plot introduction

Bruno Wildermann of the Wrinfield Circus is the world's greatest trapeze artist, a clairvoyant with near-supernatural powers and an implacable enemy of the East German regime that arrested his family and murdered his wife. The CIA needs such a man for an impossible raid on the impregnable Lubylan Fortress where his family is held, to remove a dangerous weapons formula from a heavily guarded laboratory under cover of a traveling circus tour, Bruno prepares to return to his homeland. But before the journey even begins a murderer strikes twice. Somewhere in the circus there is a communist agent with orders to stop Bruno at any cost.

Literary significance and criticism

The story, written in third person narrative, includes espionage, murder, romance and humor. Many MacLean fans do not consider this to be one of his finer works. It is typical of his later period works, in that while it is quite well plotted (if stretching the bounds of believability), it is simplistically characterized, with dryly sardonic and superbly competent protagonists (particularly Bruno Wildermann, the trapeze artist-cum-secret agent), a ravishingly beautiful and virtually helpless female protagonist, and almost cartoonish Communist antagonists.

In popular culture

In the film Operation Thunderbolt, Col. Yonatan Netanyahu (Yehoram Gaon) reads the novel en route to the 1976 Israeli raid on Entebbe Airport in Uganda.