High Road to China (novel)

Film rights were bought almost immediately and plans were announced to star Roger Moore and Jacqueline Bisset under the direction of John Huston.^[2] Cleary turned down the chance to do the adaption as he did not want to work with John Huston in Ireland for several months. Huston dropped out and was replaced by Sidney Furie then eventually Brian G. Hutton. The novel was eventually filmed in 1983, with a large number of changes made, notably the removal of the German character. Cleary regarded the adaptation as one of the greatest disappointments in his career because he thought the book could have made "one of the great adventure films".^[3]

• High Road to China at AustLit (subscription required)