The Corfu Affair the Man from Uncle #20

"The Corfu Affair" was written by John T. Phillifent, who wasn’’t one of the more prolific of the U.N.C.L.E. paperback writers. He only wrote two others in the series, “The Mad Scientist Affair" (#5) and “The Power Cube Affair” (#19)). As you can judge from his titles, he tended to emphasize science fiction elements in his U.N.C.L.E. stories more than some of the other U.N.C.L.E. paperback writers. “The Corfu Affair” is no different. The villainess of the piece, Countess Ann-Marie Louise de St.-Denis is a brilliant scientist whose experiments involve creating artificial life and mind control. Quite a leap from her known specialty of cosmetic surgery. “The Corfu Affair,” following the format of many episodes of the TV series, has Illya and Napoleon working different angles of the case separately, only to meet up at around the mid-point of the story. Also following the format of the series, we have a sort of innocent bystander character who gets caught up in the intrigue. It’s always nice to see Illya on his own, and Phillifent gives him plenty of “screen time." Napoleon, of course, gets to play his usual ladies man role. But the Countess, unfortunately for Solo, has other priorities. As these books were intended to—before the advent of home video and streaming—"The Corfu Affair" gives the reader a semblance of watching can episode of the TV show in-between the airing of that week’s episode. The book is a bit more explicit than the TV show could be, but it still generally stays within the boundaries of network television at the time.