The novels of Jack Higgins: A master storyteller

Jack Higgins (Henry Patterson) is my favourite author. To me, the bestselling British writer ranks among the finest storytellers of his generation. Like his compatriot Jeffrey Archer, Higgins made storytelling look effortless, whether he was writing wartime adventures, espionage thrillers or action novels.

Although I have not read all of his 85-odd novels, I have read many of them and look forward to reading the rest. My introduction to Higgins came in the early 1980s with his masterpiece, The Eagle Has Landed. It was followed by Hell Is Too Crowded, The Last Place God Made and A Prayer for the Dying—novels I still remember vividly.

Many of Higgins' protagonists are flawed—former IRA operatives, soldiers, mercenaries or reluctant heroes—who often live by their own moral code. They may not always be your conventional heroes, but they are easy to root for. The kind you want on your side because you know they're good men, almost saint-like, and all very likeable. 

Below are only a few of my favourite Jack Higgins novels. Ask me again tomorrow, however, and I might well replace some of them with Night of the Fox, Toll for the Brave, A Fine Night for Dying or The Keys of Hell. That's the problem—and the pleasure—of choosing favourites from an author whose books I've enjoyed for more than four decades.

Have you read Jack Higgins? If so, which of his novels would make your list?

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In Hell Is Too Crowded, American engineer Matt Brady follows a beautiful, frightened woman home to London after a night out—and wakes up to find her murdered and himself framed for the crime. Imprisoned and desperate, he must break free to clear his name. This is one of Higgins' early thrillers, first published under his real name Henry Patterson. 

Set in 1938 Brazil, The Last Place God Made is the story of down-on-his-luck British pilot Neil Mallory, who teams up with Sam Hannah, a once-legendary WWI fighter pilot now scraping a living running supplies over the Amazon. When a mission station is massacred and two nuns go missing, the two men fly into the deadly heart of the jungle to find them.

Set against the Troubles in Northern Ireland, The Savage Day introduces British agent Simon Vaughan who is sent undercover into a tense, gun-running plot involving IRA factions and a hidden fortune in stolen gold. Betrayal, sectarian violence and shifting allegiances drive this suspense thriller. 

The third in the Nick Miller series, Hell Is Always Today is a police procedural that follows Detective Sergeant Miller hunting "the Rainlover," a serial killer stalking London women on wet nights, while a separate case—an escaped boxer-turned-cat-burglar seeking revenge—runs alongside it.

In A Prayer for the Dying, IRA hitman Martin Fallon, sickened by a botched job that killed a child, flees to London hoping to escape his past—only to be blackmailed by a corrupt undertaker who witnessed his crime. Torn between a priest offering redemption and gangsters demanding one last kill, Fallon is trapped in a moral dilemma.