Hoodwink
"The Book Mainstream Publishers Would Not Handle"
Dominic Torr
With a sub-title like the above, you've just GOT to know that this book is going to leave a LOT to be desired. In 2010, the movement towards self-published books has grown dramatically and provides certain opportunities for writers that are not available under the more traditional publishing schemes. However, there's FAR more abuse in this than there is benefit and the resulting product of this change almost always falls into the category of "rubbish". So too, this book!
This is, simply, a complete recitation of every UK-biased anti-Masonic screed imaginable placed in the wrapper of a spy novel. In the UK, there seems an ever-present obsession with the Masons running the monarchy, the diplomatic service, the police and the judiciary. They don't bother themselves with the likes of Albert Pike but rather, concentrate on how they're all getting the 'short end of the stick' because they're just not Masons. It's just horrid how they suffer as a result.
In the self-created biography on his vanity publisher's site, we read "Dominic Torr served in the British Diplomatic Service during the Cold War. He has drawn on his experiences in several countries when writing his spy stories. Hoodwink benefits from his work in Germany in the last days of the German Democratic Republic. Now retired, he and his wife live in France. He continues to work in international affairs. With grandchildren arriving he is particularly concerned to help counter political reluctance to act on Climate Change."
And he's also added: HOODWINK - this tale of how the Russian secret service sought to exploit Masonic scandals claims to be the first fully researched book of fact or fiction revealing how Freemasonry actually works as a secret society in our midst since Stephen Knight’s No 1 best seller The Brotherhood (1984) and Martin Short’s sequel Inside the Brotherhood (1989). Another description goes further: "Carefully researched, Hoodwink is a post-Soviet spy yarn that reveals how Freemasonry is abused and exposes its hold on the most sensitive areas of our society. Shortly after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Russian president discovers he has inherited an ongoing operation to destabilise the British Establishment by releasing an array of Masonic scandals when Russia's illegal resident, the urbane Kate Holland (Katya Bezsmertnik), "defects" to New York. The President orders case-master General Asseyev to abort the operation, but is thwarted by outmoded technology when he discovers Katya's love affair with Edmund Rossington Bart., her chief source on Masonic misdoings. Hoodwink is certain to appeal to all thriller fans and anyone interested in the workings of Freemasonry. Russia's "illegal residents" have recently been much in the news, and there's been a dearth of books, fiction or factual, about the Masons as a secret society in our midst since the 1995 paperback edition of Martin Short's Inside the Brotherhood."
Of course, he can 'claim' all he wants but as we've shown on this site, "The Brotherhood" was a joke from the start using so-called 'research' by repeating the blathering of a complete nutter.
The author, whose real name is John Pedler, had his first book published in 1965. It would appear that his most recent book prior to this time was in 1969 - although there might have been other books as memorable as this which are not even locatable on the web or available for a few cents on EBay.
So now, after a forty year hiatus, Mr. Pedler/Torr has returned to - what was it he's back here to do? Tell us about the evils of Freemasonry? Help with Climate Change (with the words capitalized for effect perhaps - or just an indication of his lack of writing ability)? (Do Freemasons have any position on Climate Change? Have they hindered his efforts in any way?) Perhaps the answer is "Make a Buck {or Euro} Cheap" - and this time around, nobody will bother to touch a previously published author - which does seem awfully strange with publishers crying for more cold war spy stuff from those with a track record. Oh, wait: all the publishing companies are probably owned by Masons too. Isn't that what Knight and Short asserted also? See? The Freemasons indeed DO control everything!
We were unable to locate a date of birth for the concerned Mr. Torr/Pedler but one would of necessity assume that he is now well into his seventies if not far older. Perhaps some slight has caused him this angst. Perhaps he's desperate for the attention he never received and hopes to achieve it by now creating a fictional piece in which all sorts of high-ranking Russian military and politicians longing for the old Soviet Union are matched with everyone in the British Monarchy and the US Diplomatic Service to bring about a "New World Order" run by Freemasonry.... Who knows what his motive but suffice it to say that his return to writing after four decades is FAR from heralded - and his "careful research" is nothing more than the usual masonophobia with the British slant, sure to appeal to those with huge amounts of time on their hands and not wanting to read something more worthwhile.
Want to waste your money? Click here
You'll also note on Amazon a critique of my review there along with glowing praise for the book by another self-styled 'author' of similar rubbish whose book sales were, apparently, demolished by my critique of his work. Based on his own writing, it seems quite clear why he'd praise Torr's work.
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