Redemption, by Leon Uris (HarperCollins, £6.99 in UK)

The jacket tells us that this is "the sequel of the worldwide bestseller Trinity"

The jacket tells us that this is "the sequel of the worldwide bestseller Trinity". It is over 800 pages long, so nobody can say he or she is being short charged in terms of length; nor in terms of sex, melodrama and fighting. The story is allegedly set in pre independence Ireland, but in reality it is set in Hollywood land and nowhere else, since most of the characters appear to be mid of celluloid or plastic rather than flesh and blood, and the way they talk belongs to Uris alone. The novel is predictably panoramic, changing its location every few chapters, and there is even a lengthy sequence set on the Turkish Front during the first World War.

American bestsellers tend to give most European readers aesthetic indigestion, but nobody can doubt that Uris, on his own terms, knows what he is at and what his public likes.