The Honorary Consul is a British thriller novel by Graham Greene, published in 1973. It was one of the author's favourite works. The story is set in Corrientes, a city in northern Argentina, near the border with Paraguay which can be assumed from the police cars that reads ¨Policía de Corrientes¨. Eduardo Plarr is a young doctor of English descent. As a boy, he left Paraguay with his mother, escaping to Buenos Aires while his English father remained in Paraguay as a political rebel. Aside from a single hand-delivered letter, they never hear from the father again. When Plarr... moves to the quiet, subtropical backwater town, he strikes up acquaintance with the only two English inhabitants, a bitter old English teacher, Humphries, and the Honorary Consul of the title, Charles Fortnum, a divorced, self-pitying alcoholic who misuses his position. Plarr's other main acquaintance is Julio Saavedra, a forgotten but self-important Argentine writer of novels full of silent machismo. Visiting the local brothel with Saavedra, Plarr is attracted to a girl, but she is taken by another man. A couple of years later, he is called to treat Fortnum's new wife.
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| Author: | Graham Greene |
| Genre: | Spy fiction, Fiction, Speculative fiction, Suspense |
| Year published: | 1973 |
| Number of editions: | 18 |