Guns in the Heather by Lockhart Amerman, 1963.

This book was the basis for the Disney made-for-tv movie The Secret of Boyne Castle. However, the book and the movie are very different.  Although they have a similar premise, many details were changed in the movie version, the first of which is that the location of the story was moved from Scotland, as it was in the original book, to Ireland.

Jonathan Flower, sometimes called “Posy” by his friends, spends most of his time at various boarding schools.  His mother died when he was very young, and his father has a government job that takes him all over the world, so Jonathan has been in boarding schools in various countries, seeing his father whenever he can during school breaks.  For the most part, Jonathan doesn’t really mind it.  He and his father get along pretty well, and he knows that his father’s work is important.

Right now, he’s at a boarding school in Scotland.  He’s made a lot of friends there, spending holidays like Christmas and Easter at various friends’ homes.  He’s also developed an interest in rugby and cricket.  He anticipates that his father will meet him at the end of the school year so that they can go mountain climbing together over the summer break.  However, shortly before his father is expected to arrive, Jonathan receives a telegram from him, saying that he is to go to a certain place and meet a Mr. Finch.  Because the telegram contains certain words that this father uses when a situation is urgent, Jonathan goes to meet Mr. Finch and is kidnapped.

Mr. Finch, who also goes by the alias Dr. Fisher, holds Jonathan captive in a house, pretending that Jonathan is a patient who has volunteered for an experimental treatment.  Fortunately, Jonathan’s father, disguised as a milkman, soon rescues him.

While Jonathan’s father, who is actually a government agent, attends to some of his duties, Jonathan tries to go to the American embassy, only to be misled and almost recaptured. For a time, he is on his own, unsure of who to trust and how to reconnect with his father. When the two of them finally meet again, they both seek shelter with friends, but their enemies aren’t far behind, no matter where they go.  They end up staying with friends who own an old castle, but their enemies are planning a siege.

My Reaction

The style of the writing in this book doesn’t make for a particularly easy read.  It’s not overly difficult, but it starts off slow and is very dense, unlike many more modern books.  The scenes also change quickly throughout the book, and I had trouble keeping track of who some of the characters were.  Overall, I preferred the movie, even though it didn’t follow the book very closely.

In the Disney movie version, a strange man drives onto the grounds of an Irish boarding school, stumbles out of his car, and whispers an urgent message to a teenage American exchange student (played by a young Kurt Russell and renamed Richard Evans) that is meant for his older brother.  Then, the man dies from a bullet wound.  Another man, who is ostensibly from the American embassy in Dublin, abducts Richard after saying that he needs to go to the embassy to make a statement about the stranger’s death.  Richard is also accompanied by an Irish friend, Sean, when he is lured away from the school, and his friend helps him as they escape from the enemy spies holding them captive.  The two of them search for Richard’s older brother (who they have only just learned is a spy, whereas Jonathan was aware that his father worked for the government) to give him the dead man’s message.  In both the book and the movie, there is a final showdown with the bad guys at a castle, but in the movie, they go to the castle to retrieve a secret message that the dead man left there.  I don’t think that the movie is available on dvd, but I have seen it on YouTube and Internet Archive.