Reviews

Our Man in Havana by Graham Greene

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jo_gray15's review against another edition

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adventurous funny mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

mark_b's review against another edition

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4.0

Our Man in Havana is a short comic novel that concerns Mr Wormwood, a single father, and his teenaged daughter, Milly. Mr Wormwood is a British expat living in Havana; he sells vacuum cleaners. He is approached by a British spy and becomes a reluctant secret agent. Wormwood needs the money, so he prepares fake reports and sends them back to the spymasters in London. One of his reports includes a drawing of an unidentified device under construction near a Cuban military base; the device looks like a vacuum cleaner.

Graham Greene, the author, once worked for the British secret services, and this book mocks his former employers, and intelligence services generally. Our Man in Havana was published in 1958, the year of the Cuban Revolution. It is set in pre-revolution times, but just barely.

The N-word appears in the first sentence of the first chapter, and again later in the book. This perhaps wasn’t as jarring in 1958 as it is now. Our Man in Havana is hardly a life-changing novel, but enjoyable, despite the dated dialog.

timw's review against another edition

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funny lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot

4.25

monkeyboystiff's review against another edition

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4.0

Quite enjoyed it - some bits were very funny, and the who plot was compact and concise. Was a little hard to follow in some places - books written around that era seem to omit any inflection when the characters speak, and the dialogue doesn't sound how real people talk. So keeping track of what's going on can be tricky. I also prefer it when books fully explain everything, so I know I didn't miss something (that's my flaw of course, not the book's!). So when there is no clear indication who the "enemy" agents are, I start to wonder whether I just accidentally skipped that part, rather than it was kept deliberately ambiguous.

I also found Wormold's motives a bit confusing near the start of his charade - why did he not imagine he'd get caught? How could he ever think it would be a good idea to make up false information?! What if it sparked off some kind of incident? But I reconciled this by realising he was very short sighted and didn't really consider his actions - this was a character flaw.

Would like to try some more Graham Greene now, and see what the quality's like.