21 SEPTEMBER 1956, Page 24

It's a Crime

DEATH OF AN ADMIRAL. By Gilbert Hackforth-Jones. (Hodder and Stoughton, 12s. 6d.) Long, meaty mystery solved by naval two-and-a-half-striper in course of fascinatingly well-documented submarine cruise, with lashings of local (or professional) colour, and a good deal of flash-back to the piping times of war. The final explanatory monologue—thirty-odd pages of it—is possibly the longest since three-decker novels went out of fashion, and may be the submariner author's way of training to hold his breath under water.