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Hugo Fitzduane #1
Games of the Hangman
When war photographer Hugo Fitzduane discovers the body of a local student hanging from a branch of a tree in his yard, he becomes involved in a terrorist plot. Reprint.
497 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1991
3 people are currently reading
151 people want to read
About the author
Victor O'Reilly
10 books16 followersNew York Times Best Selling Author and National Security Consultant. Author of: GAMES OF THE HANGMAN, RULES OF THE HUNT, THE DEVIL'S FOOTPRINT. Consultant to the Vice Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army. Adviser to the U.S. Congress. Author of a series of reports for Congressman Jim Saxton, Member of the House Armed Services Committee and Chairman of the Unconventional Warfare Subcommittee. Public speaker on terrorism issues to various groups including the U.S. Marine Corps Intelligence Association. Extensive knowledge of the United States Army in particular and National Security issues in general.
Prior to becoming an author, acquired a wide range of commercial experience in a variety of countries. Started Addmaster Corporation UK which was highly successful. Previously worked for Doyle Dane Bernbach Advertising and United Biscuits. Main business training prior to becoming a CEO was in marketing.
Currently lives in the USA.
See also http://victororeilly.blogspot.com/.
http://www.dgliterary.com/satans-smil...
aka Lewis Adair . See
Prior to becoming an author, acquired a wide range of commercial experience in a variety of countries. Started Addmaster Corporation UK which was highly successful. Previously worked for Doyle Dane Bernbach Advertising and United Biscuits. Main business training prior to becoming a CEO was in marketing.
Currently lives in the USA.
See also http://victororeilly.blogspot.com/.
http://www.dgliterary.com/satans-smil...
aka Lewis Adair . See
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Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
April 23, 2012
Thia book was horrible. It was cliche and predictable. I suffered through it because I was certain it absolutely had to get better, but no. Do not waste your time.
October 14, 2014
I bought this book without any previous knowledge of the author or the book itself. What prompted me to get it was that it seemed to have an intriguing premise and lots of good reviews, not least of all, an uncharacteristically raving one by the ever-dependable and not-very-charitable folks at Publishers Weekly.
And, boy, am I glad that I got this book. It turned out to be one of the most highly accomplished action thrillers that I’ve read; and I do not say this lightly, having read literally hundreds of them, and I am not a reader that is easy to please.
This assured debut by Victor O’Reilly managed to be highly entertaining without bringing anything new to the genre. This novel falls in the category of what the critics call ‘International Suspense and Intrigue’ since it spans several continents and has political elements as the backdrop of the story.
‘Games of the Hangman’ has the right recipe for a successful thriller:
The hero, Fitzduane, is a hero in every sense of the word - he is some sort of an ex-commando with a highly developed moral and ethical sense; the villain is a Harvard-educated psychopath whose brutality and ruthlessness are scary even by the standards of the genre – he is an international terrorist with just one goal: money; a powerful narrative drive successfully sustained throughout the book's five hundred pages of small-font print; and enough dead bodies to fill up a small Swiss town (a lot of the action takes place in Bern).
Most of the brutal killings are described, one feels, almost lovingly, and in exceedingly grisly detail. The novel is populated with many interesting and oddball characters, and some readers might find the sheer number of characters hard to keep track of; but the author does a good job of keeping things engaging for the reader to such an extent that even the peripheral characters are memorable enough to remember, at least, till the end of the novel. One aspect of the book that I really enjoyed was that it was generously sprinkled with a dry wit and sarcastic humour which had me chuckling at regular intervals throughout the length of the book.
Most of the action sequences in the book were highly cinematic and one wonders where is Hollywood when it is needed the most. The final showdown was pulse-pounding and exhilarating and left me breathless at times. It took place in a seven hundred-year old castle on a remote Irish island where all the good guys were under siege from a small army of highly trained terrorists headed, naturally, by our very own Ivy League terror-monger villain. The siege was right out of the medieval times, but, of course, with enough modern weaponry on both sides to shame even the most violent factions of the IRA.
This is O’Reilly’s first novel and I am definitely going to dig up more of his books. I wish they are half as good as this one.
My highest rating for your novel, Mr. O’Reilly. Keep up the good work.
Two thumbs up.
And, boy, am I glad that I got this book. It turned out to be one of the most highly accomplished action thrillers that I’ve read; and I do not say this lightly, having read literally hundreds of them, and I am not a reader that is easy to please.
This assured debut by Victor O’Reilly managed to be highly entertaining without bringing anything new to the genre. This novel falls in the category of what the critics call ‘International Suspense and Intrigue’ since it spans several continents and has political elements as the backdrop of the story.
‘Games of the Hangman’ has the right recipe for a successful thriller:
The hero, Fitzduane, is a hero in every sense of the word - he is some sort of an ex-commando with a highly developed moral and ethical sense; the villain is a Harvard-educated psychopath whose brutality and ruthlessness are scary even by the standards of the genre – he is an international terrorist with just one goal: money; a powerful narrative drive successfully sustained throughout the book's five hundred pages of small-font print; and enough dead bodies to fill up a small Swiss town (a lot of the action takes place in Bern).
Most of the brutal killings are described, one feels, almost lovingly, and in exceedingly grisly detail. The novel is populated with many interesting and oddball characters, and some readers might find the sheer number of characters hard to keep track of; but the author does a good job of keeping things engaging for the reader to such an extent that even the peripheral characters are memorable enough to remember, at least, till the end of the novel. One aspect of the book that I really enjoyed was that it was generously sprinkled with a dry wit and sarcastic humour which had me chuckling at regular intervals throughout the length of the book.
Most of the action sequences in the book were highly cinematic and one wonders where is Hollywood when it is needed the most. The final showdown was pulse-pounding and exhilarating and left me breathless at times. It took place in a seven hundred-year old castle on a remote Irish island where all the good guys were under siege from a small army of highly trained terrorists headed, naturally, by our very own Ivy League terror-monger villain. The siege was right out of the medieval times, but, of course, with enough modern weaponry on both sides to shame even the most violent factions of the IRA.
This is O’Reilly’s first novel and I am definitely going to dig up more of his books. I wish they are half as good as this one.
My highest rating for your novel, Mr. O’Reilly. Keep up the good work.
Two thumbs up.
September 10, 2013
This was one of those desperation buys that turned out well - stopped in a thrift store to grab something that looked interesting, just to have something to read over dinner. I'm not much a fan of political-type thrillers, and the reference to Ludlum on the cover almost put me off, but something about the description convinced me it was worth at least spending a few hours with.
Hugo Fitzduane is a former member of an Irish elite military force-turned-war photographer, and when he's not traipsing the globe taking pictures he lives in a remote island off the coast of Ireland, in a castle that has been in his family for hundreds of years. Not a cushy, plushly-appointed castle - a place designed for military defense and not all that updated for modern convenience. Oh, and chock-full of weaponry of all sorts, both antique and modern. Seems the Fitzduanes are fond of collecting things that go boom. Also sharing the island is a sort of finishing school for children of wealthy parents, who for one reason or another feel their kids need the place's odd mix of traditional education, physical challenge, and obscure location.
When Fitzduane happens on the body of a student who has hanged himself and is compelled to investigate what led to the young man's death, he is drawn into a mystery that will tax every skill he has learned just to keep up with his quarry, a sadistic international terrorist whose inexplicable game warps everyone he encounters.
The good parts: What kept me engaged was the characters and their interaction - the mature, loving relationship of Hugo and his long-time girlfriend Etan; the insubordinate but highly capable Swiss police officer, Bear; Hugo's former superior, Kilmara, who is very good at his job as head of Ireland's national anti-terrorist group when not obstructed by politicians. And the book is FUNNY in places - often the sort of gallows humor you find among compatriots working at a difficult task or in a stressful field. I also enjoyed the depiction of life in Bern, Switzerland, where murder is extremely uncommon, and a series of violent deaths upsets not just those directly affected, but the order of the whole city. I also appreciated the inclusion of women amid the fighting - not just as non-participants needing to be protected, but as tough and wily fighters themselves.
The bad parts: over-the-top, gloatingly evil, sadistic bad guy, and accompanying gore galore. Gratuitous sex. I like a good sex scene, but really? Hugo goes around getting boners as readily as a kid half his age, and virtually every woman he meets wants to have sex with him. (Being a one-woman-man, though, he resists, managing even to avoid offending the rejected women. A paragon among men!)
Too much dwelling on military hardware for me, but I'm sure devotees of the genre would delight in the details.
Hugo Fitzduane is a former member of an Irish elite military force-turned-war photographer, and when he's not traipsing the globe taking pictures he lives in a remote island off the coast of Ireland, in a castle that has been in his family for hundreds of years. Not a cushy, plushly-appointed castle - a place designed for military defense and not all that updated for modern convenience. Oh, and chock-full of weaponry of all sorts, both antique and modern. Seems the Fitzduanes are fond of collecting things that go boom. Also sharing the island is a sort of finishing school for children of wealthy parents, who for one reason or another feel their kids need the place's odd mix of traditional education, physical challenge, and obscure location.
When Fitzduane happens on the body of a student who has hanged himself and is compelled to investigate what led to the young man's death, he is drawn into a mystery that will tax every skill he has learned just to keep up with his quarry, a sadistic international terrorist whose inexplicable game warps everyone he encounters.
The good parts: What kept me engaged was the characters and their interaction - the mature, loving relationship of Hugo and his long-time girlfriend Etan; the insubordinate but highly capable Swiss police officer, Bear; Hugo's former superior, Kilmara, who is very good at his job as head of Ireland's national anti-terrorist group when not obstructed by politicians. And the book is FUNNY in places - often the sort of gallows humor you find among compatriots working at a difficult task or in a stressful field. I also enjoyed the depiction of life in Bern, Switzerland, where murder is extremely uncommon, and a series of violent deaths upsets not just those directly affected, but the order of the whole city. I also appreciated the inclusion of women amid the fighting - not just as non-participants needing to be protected, but as tough and wily fighters themselves.
The bad parts: over-the-top, gloatingly evil, sadistic bad guy, and accompanying gore galore. Gratuitous sex. I like a good sex scene, but really? Hugo goes around getting boners as readily as a kid half his age, and virtually every woman he meets wants to have sex with him. (Being a one-woman-man, though, he resists, managing even to avoid offending the rejected women. A paragon among men!)
Too much dwelling on military hardware for me, but I'm sure devotees of the genre would delight in the details.
July 14, 2013
After reading the last page of the story and proceeded to read the Acknowledgement section of the book, I was quite surprised to find out that the author, Victor O'Reilly, himself had a dark, depressing, and disturbing experience of finding a hanged body from a tree much like the lead character in the novel, Hugo Fitzduane, did. O'Reilly said that this event in his life inspired him to write the book.
I picked up "Games of the Hangman" a few years ago from a thrift shop because the title intrigued me. Overall, it's generally entertaining. I'm not one to read about books with detectives and normal people with experience doing police work on it, but most of them in here seem likable and memorable enough. I particularly like the Bear and Kilmara.
However, just like some good television series that start out strong then begin to wilt somewhere near the end, "Games of the Hangman" pretty much nosedived in a perceptive and utterly familiar way. I noticed that there was a sudden increase in mistakes made by characters that made me feel the author deliberately made them do stupid things just to "make things happen" or "advance the story". If this were true, then here's my sad face --> :(
Anyhow, I just hope that I won't see any of that in future O'Reilly books featuring Fitzduane. I'm still going to read his books.
I picked up "Games of the Hangman" a few years ago from a thrift shop because the title intrigued me. Overall, it's generally entertaining. I'm not one to read about books with detectives and normal people with experience doing police work on it, but most of them in here seem likable and memorable enough. I particularly like the Bear and Kilmara.
However, just like some good television series that start out strong then begin to wilt somewhere near the end, "Games of the Hangman" pretty much nosedived in a perceptive and utterly familiar way. I noticed that there was a sudden increase in mistakes made by characters that made me feel the author deliberately made them do stupid things just to "make things happen" or "advance the story". If this were true, then here's my sad face --> :(
Anyhow, I just hope that I won't see any of that in future O'Reilly books featuring Fitzduane. I'm still going to read his books.
April 15, 2021
It started out average, got slightly better, then crashed. Reading the last 100+ pages was pure torture. It. Just. Wouldn’t. End.
July 8, 2024
First in a series - it figures. So far so good as the story is off the nasty and brooding start. That's as far as I've gotten. Never heard of the author(I "rescued" this book somewhere and it's been dust-collecting on my shelves). Seems well-written so far. Early 90's thriller w/o much presence on Goodreads.
And now I'm finished after skip-skimming the last 100 or so pages. These were action-packed pages, to be sure, but they were also crammed with seemingly endless info drops on weaponry and tactical planning. The final battle itself was mucho overkill(putting it mildly) and one of the G'reads reviews had it right - it was just ridiculously overdone. It reminded me of the Battle of Hogwarts in twice as many pages. So... if your tastes run to words like "penis" and "clitoris" and "blood"/"bloody"(these two words alone must have appeared a hundred times in the text), then this might be a book for you. Judicious editing might've helped and earned the book a higher rating, but at the end I gave up trying to find a justification for a 3* rating and gave it the 2* rating it so richly deserves.
-All through the book = way too much descriptive blah-blah. Also too many characters causing reader brain stress.
- Reminds me a bit of "Red Dragon"/"Manhunter". "Shibumi"...
- The logical problems are too numerous to mention, but here's one anyway... An Israeli agent was at the big gathering in Libya when the Hangman addressed his "army" and revealed some of his big plan. Despite the help he might've provided, this agent doesn't appear in the plot until nearly the end. Did he take a vacation?
- That's right Hugo, leave Ivo's gift package just sitting on the table.
- The author tries to explain away Hugo's lack of interest in the freighter. Doesn't work. What about Hugo's infallible instincts????
And now I'm finished after skip-skimming the last 100 or so pages. These were action-packed pages, to be sure, but they were also crammed with seemingly endless info drops on weaponry and tactical planning. The final battle itself was mucho overkill(putting it mildly) and one of the G'reads reviews had it right - it was just ridiculously overdone. It reminded me of the Battle of Hogwarts in twice as many pages. So... if your tastes run to words like "penis" and "clitoris" and "blood"/"bloody"(these two words alone must have appeared a hundred times in the text), then this might be a book for you. Judicious editing might've helped and earned the book a higher rating, but at the end I gave up trying to find a justification for a 3* rating and gave it the 2* rating it so richly deserves.
-All through the book = way too much descriptive blah-blah. Also too many characters causing reader brain stress.
- Reminds me a bit of "Red Dragon"/"Manhunter". "Shibumi"...
- The logical problems are too numerous to mention, but here's one anyway... An Israeli agent was at the big gathering in Libya when the Hangman addressed his "army" and revealed some of his big plan. Despite the help he might've provided, this agent doesn't appear in the plot until nearly the end. Did he take a vacation?
- That's right Hugo, leave Ivo's gift package just sitting on the table.
- The author tries to explain away Hugo's lack of interest in the freighter. Doesn't work. What about Hugo's infallible instincts????
October 12, 2017
Good suspense. Nice twists and turns. Similar to Ludlum but not quite as good. The final confrontation became rather tedious.
January 7, 2018
Fast paced with strong characters set in an escapist but somewhat relatable environment. The author has a strong gift for action and the pace.
December 7, 2025
Tremendous!
**** 4 Stars.
**** 4 Stars.
August 23, 2014
It was a fun book. The character of Fitzduane, a war photographer, who survives on his instincts was interesting to read. All the travel from Ireland to Switzerland and the different cultural aspects shown among a Irish and a Swiss is enlightening and I hope its true. I mostly depend on books to teach me about people and their culture. So some swiss and Irish people should read this book and tell me if the stuff the writer is telling about both the cultures are true or not.
More about the book. It is a interesting book where you don't know who is actually the Hangman until the mid-section of the book and this fact just binds you to the book even more. What I missed in the book was more of the early psychologist of Kadar. When I was reading that part I was hoping some more of the conversations to come off ,later in the book but it did not, because that page actually hooked me up to the whole novel. Also the fact that whole novel starts based on a instinct of a war photographer was something hard to follow. I almost put the book down after reading 25 pages because it was too slow in the begining.
More about the book. It is a interesting book where you don't know who is actually the Hangman until the mid-section of the book and this fact just binds you to the book even more. What I missed in the book was more of the early psychologist of Kadar. When I was reading that part I was hoping some more of the conversations to come off ,later in the book but it did not, because that page actually hooked me up to the whole novel. Also the fact that whole novel starts based on a instinct of a war photographer was something hard to follow. I almost put the book down after reading 25 pages because it was too slow in the begining.
August 25, 2015
I remember reading this book when it came out around 1992 and absolutely loved it. I bought the author's other books and thought they too were great. I actually contacted and received a reply from the author himself. Unfortunately he has not produced any other books (as far as I know). If anyone knows otherwise, please let me know.
July 19, 2013
Lots of page-turning action. Much of it takes place in and around Bern, Switzerland. One of the main characters, the Swiss investigator, is based on our friend who is a retired real Bern investigator! I'll definitely read more by this author.
Read
September 5, 2009This is an intense novel including terroist, murders and sex. It is riveting. Very good book
Read
April 2, 2011Like Tom Clancy
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 19, 2008
This was a great read that was fast moving and kept you thinking.
January 14, 2013
I read it 20 years ago and remember liking it.
February 18, 2015
Exciting, fast paced, international crime/terrorist story, couldn't put it down
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews