THE LABYRINTHINE WAYS

Another Mexico was the plaint of a Catholic touring Mexico and finding little to his taste. Brighton Rock was mystery-adventure. Now in this novel, Greene has used his Mexican background (none too savory) for a vitriolic story in the Rogue Male genre. His Catholic adherents won't relish his picture of the whisky priest; his liberal readers won't find the red shirt lieutenant of police particularly inspiring a figure, so let's forget motives and backgrounds, and see this as sheer adventure, as the craven, cowardly priest seeks refuge with his stupid, loyal peasants, and flees terrified from the wrath of the law. In the dialog one gets various facets of modern Mexico, and there emerges a somewhat macabre picture of Mexico today.