The Rose of Tibet

Book excerpt: The Rose of Tibet (1962) was Lionel Davidson's second novel, an extraordinary and thrilling tale of a haunted land which prompted Graham Greene to remark: 'I hadn't realised how much I had missed the genuine adventure story until I read The Rose of Tibet.' Its combination of adventure and travelogue serves further proof of Davidson's great variety as a writer. Daphne du Maurier thought it offered 'all the excitement of King Solomon's Mines.'Hugh Whittington has gone missing - reported dead while filming near Mount Everest. Determined to find him, his brother Charles embarks on a perilous and illegal journey from India into the forbidden land of Tibet, all the way to the monastery of Yamdring. There awaits a woman with a deadly and ghostly secret, an emerald treasure to guard and the invading Chinese Red Army.