[Kanfer is an American novelist, short story writer, dramatist, essayist, and journalist. In the following review, he asserts that characterization in The Color of Blood is superficial and that Moore rushes through issues which would have benefited from more extensive development.]

Graham Greene should have no trouble entering the kingdom of heaven. It is on earth that he has much to answer for. Every paperback page-turner whose cover proclaims the coming of a new Existential Thriller ("He carried the war home with him like an infection!"), every fictive burnout in the CIA or the KGB ("Only he could tell the difference as the lines between the superpowers began to blur!"), every backdrop of mist, intrigue, and betrayal on the far side of civilization ("The 'infidels' knew truths that eluded the West!") owes its existence to the place that some wag dubbed Greeneland a half century ago.

Most of these works are ignored by the Master, but occasionally he displays pleasure when a disciple apes the famous trademarks: tongue-and-groove construction, political cynicism, and religious turmoil. John Le Carré has made a career of it, starting with The Spy Who Came In from the Cold ("The Best Spy Novel I Have Ever Read"—Graham Greene) and continuing through the let's-not-be-beastly-to-the-Palestinians theme of The Little Drummer Girl. The steadiest in a long, winding line of acolytes is Brian Moore, whose most appealing books are explorations of feminine psychology and a crisis of faith (The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne), re-examinations of the past (The Black Robe, The Great Victorian Collection: "My favorite living novelist … treats the novel as a tamer treats a wild beast"—Graham Greene), and the sociology of theology (Catholics: "Funny, sad, and very moving"—Graham Greene). Moore's lesser works, "entertainments" in Greene's term, are thrillers written under the name of Michael Bryan. In his spare time the author has written screenplays, among them the moribund Torn Curtain for Alfred Hitchcock.

The Color of Blood fuses the high Moore and the low. It contains the dependable themes of prelate and thugs, foreign landscape and confusion of realms. This time out the cleric has escalated to cardinal, and the novelist has heightened the tempo. An assassination attempt occurs in the opening scene. Cardinal Bem, of a place very much like Poland, escapes with his life, but his loyal chauffeur is killed. Who would want to gun down the blameless Bem? His is the voice of compromise, attempting to reconcile the workers' movement with the demands of Marxist overlords. As it turns out, the marriage of Solidarity and the state is held at arm's length not only by the rulers but by the intransigent Archbishop Krasnoy. He plans to deliver a speech inciting the population to "an expression of national will," that is, counterrevolution. Red hat orders white hat to expunge all political content from his speech—or else. But Bem loses his authority when three officials appear at his residence and abduct him to a mysterious country house. Are they State Security men? Or are they forces within the Church itself? Bem makes many disheartening discoveries as he escapes into the hinterlands and finds himself at the whim and mercy of commoners with whom he had lost touch years ago.

This is Moore's 15th novel—perhaps one should say screenplay. It shows the practiced hand of a man who knows how to tighten suspense, provide chases and confrontations on cue, scatter ambiguities like bread crumbs along the way, and head toward what paperback publishers like to call a shattering climax.

But is it? Technically the author brings off his scenario. There is a sharply defined protagonist, plus narrow escapes and the classic soupçons of violence. But there are also instances of prepackaged cynicism: "Maybe it's true, as that knife grinder said, that the regime stuffs our mouth with sausage to keep us quiet. But what of the other world, the world that Henry Krasnoy calls free? Are the poor any better off there?" And there are unconvincing close-ups of the believer in crisis: "'I don't know what the pope wants anymore,' the old man said. 'Where is the pope this week? Brazil? Japan? Who knows?'" And perfunctory glimpses of the Church undergoing alteration: "I admit that in the past, our priests have been as anti-Semitic as the rest of our people. But we are trying to change that." How "we" are trying remains offscreen. Perhaps Kurt Waldheim can enlighten us in a sequel.

All this might not have mattered if Moore had developed his plot and people. But The Color of Blood is 179 pages—the proper length for what film-makers call a treatment, but far too brief for the subjects introduced and then abruptly dismissed, as if the author was in a hurry to get on to his next project. A pity; Moore used to explore the mental and moral life of his characters en route. And when he played with symbols in the old days, he was never so obvious. In The Color of Blood he makes Bem the son of a stableman, and throughout his final days the cardinal cannot find a good place to lay his head. Although it would be unsporting to reveal the finale, no reader should be surprised to find grand tragedy at the fade-out. After all, this is a truly Christian leader who speaks the truth to uncomprehending souls.

As such he makes an appealing figure. One would have liked to see Cardinal Bem in a setting worthy of him, his anguish, and his author. Here Moore, who began so well some 30 years ago with the moving sorrows of a lonely spinster, seems to suffer from a form of literary anorexia. It may be the impatience of age—the author is 66—or the demands of a crowded schedule. Or it may be one more instance of too-close imitation. In that case, Moore has fallen long. The Tenth Man, Greene's latest, took just 156 pages to tell its tale.