Caged Eagle

Sidney Allinson is Canadian news correspondent for Britain’s The Army
Quarterly and Defence. He is the author of The Bantams: The Untold Story
of World War I, Jeremy Kane, and Kruger’s Gold: A Novel of the
Anglo-Boer War.

This novel of derring-do in the Second World War and political
shenanigans afterward seems to reflect most of the author’s personal
experiences. Like the main protagonist, Rohmer is a veteran fighter
reconnaissance pilot of World War II, a prominent lawyer, and a
confidant of prime ministers. He molds these factors into an interesting
story about an intrepid airman who returns to Canada and enters the
high-stakes world of big business. Corporate intrigues and an eye on the
main chance lead to his transformation into a senator and a powerful,
wealthy man.

Caged Eagle reads like two distinct books in one. The first half, which
follows the protagonist’s adventures as a combat flyer, rings true in
every detail. So much so, it could be a factual documentary about how it
really was for those gallant Royal Canadian Air Force pilots of Mustang
fighter planes who flew dangerous low-level photo-recon operations over
German-occupied France in 1944. Their understated bravery, wartime
attitudes, squadron routine, and contemporary slang is all portrayed
“bang on,” as they would have put it. One particular air combat
incident foreshadows a grim secret that is not revealed until half a
century later.

The second half of the book is something of a letdown. Compared with
his heroes, Rohmer’s businesspeople and politicians seem drab. After
leaping abruptly ahead four decades to when the protagonist is a
long-established tycoon and powerful senator, the narrative focuses on
corporate jargon, financial institutions, and familiar Canadian public
issues of the past two decades. The reader is rewarded with a sudden and
surprising denouement on the last page, but at the same time left with
the skeptical feeling that it would be unlikely that a senator caught
out like this in real life would suffer any consequences.