The Lion of Delos

[from inside flap of Delacourt dj]

When Virginia Sandersen arrived on Mykonos, one of the sunny Greek isles, in search of her missing twin sister, Lee, she realized she was being followed. Her sister's letter had alarmed her: what was really going on at the Boutique Cleopatra, the shop Lee was managing for her boss, Kriton Fileas? Lee had always been the one who could manage on her own, yet her brief note spoke of trouble, and Virginia had felt mysteriously compelled to come to her rescue, whatever the consequences to herself and to her own safety. Virginia feared that she too was now involved in the strange and terrifying series of events that had already caused her sister's disappearance.

Against the backdrop of the colorful, fascinating islands, this suspenseful novel follows Virginia and the handsome Nat Ross in their pursuit of Lee's kidnappers. Investigating every clue, they find, the two are soon caught up in a sinister plot which involves them both in an international smuggling ring and a murder. The terror and helplessness Virginia feels as she races, against her will toward her awful fate, will hold every reader spellbound. With a mastery matching that of Phyllis Whitney and Dorothy Eden, Anne Worboys has woven an exciting thriller, a compelling story filled with suspense and danger.

Midway through The Lion of Delos, MC Virginia and her handsome (tawny-eyed -- as befits the theme) companion, Nat, find themselves at the Sacred Lake on Delos, gazing at the lone palm that, the story goes, sheltered Leto as she labored and birthed Artemis and Apollo. Nat is derisive: "the repro job" -- this version was planted in the late 19th century by French archaeologists. Virginia, laughingly, defends: "In another twenty years or so it will be an antique and perhaps you will treat it with respect." (154) And this is one of the most delightful things about vintage reading: you're able to see the ruins at Delos through the eyes of 1974, and then, immediately, go online and visit the same site today. The palm, now antique, still "st[ands] alone among the wild grasses and stunted bushes", looking slightly scraggly from the years. We are none, you may say, as we were in '74 (if we even were).

I love travelogue-leaning reads and Anne Worboys's outsider description of the Greek islands is one of the strongest parts of the book. Her first impression of Myokonos is nothing if not evocative: "Cinnamon doors and windows, green wooden balconies, a blue curtain stark against the frost-white of the walls, caiques hard Greek reds, orange, and vermillion within a hyacinth bay." (26) Lion includes lots of detailed description of what it felt like to walk around the island in the early 1970s -- all the sights, smells, sounds -- donkeys with hats, omnipresent stray cats & bearded, backpacked students, and, always and everywhere, the heat -- at least from the perspective of a British tourist. This last part is where the problems also start. As was habit with British writers, Worboys does a lot of essentializing of ethnicity, of the Greek character, in ways that range from patronizing (those colorful peasants), to straight-up unflattering (the men are domineering, oversexed -- "he moved in closer in that tom-cat way he had. His mouth was at once carnal and callous" (73) -- wife-beaters and their women are more or less ok with it).

As was common in suspense from this period, Lion derives a lot of its tension from the threat of sexual violence that hangs heavily over Virginia's experience. Coming face to face for the first time with the man who's been trailing her, she comforts herself with the thought that "a man cannot murder, abduct, or rape a girl in full view of several hundred eyes. Or can he?" (16) and her experiences walking by sidewalk cafes filled with men convinces her early on "that the whole of Greece was hell for a girl on her own." (13)

It's always depressing to read what women traveling, or just engaging in social interaction alone, faced at that time, and even more so, to see how these otherwise really entertaining books naturalized a lot of it. When Virginia confronts the man who's been following her and he says "I am an ordinary tourist with a penchant for following blondes. Why won't you accept that?", she doesn't think he's a creep: she just wishes fervently that that were true. She readily forgives Nat for gaslighting her about the danger she's in from another character "Has he made a pass at you? You've got to remember the Greeks are a naturally sensuous, amorous lot.. Ride it along, Virginia." (88)

Nat's overt sexism isn't a deal breaker, either: she makes a suggestion, sees from his expression that he "did not easily tolerate a woman holding the reins", and the thing that occurs to her is that "somehow it seemed ridiculous to think of Nat needing help from a woman -- a mere woman." (173) When her plan pays off, she's so excited and pleased with his approval that "being treated like a puppy did not bother me a bit." (219) Outside of the Ethel M. Dell crowd, I can't think of a female MC from the teens and 20s who would have taken that -- or stood for a man who "ignored my angry interjection the way a father might ignore a fractious child" (58) -- and yet the Virginias of the 60s and 70s seem to accept this as par for the course. You sometimes get the painful sense that these female authors are carrying water for the postwar resurgence of patriarchy and that feels like a betrayal of all the hopes, and work, of generations of writers before. I'm really interested in reading some longer-writing authors (like Berta Ruck) who published across these periods to see whether their perspectives changed or whether they were more out-of-step in later years, and how...

Overall, I'd say The Lion of Delos is worth it for its colorful, sun-drenched setting and interesting for what it says about the bounds of acceptable (and romantic) gender relations, at the time. The plot, while not especially mysterious, moves along well and builds to a satisfyingly dramatic climax.

Flags: Domestic violence. A Jewish character is portrayed as evil in a way that's very historically particular -- and uncomfortable (Holocaust backstory).

(Americans are portrayed as loud, gauche, over-resourced, and amoral -- but that's just...whatever. :D)