Castle Minerva is a 1954 spy thriller novel by the British writer Victor Canning.

[1] A contemporary review in The Sunday Times concluded "Castle Minerva not only brilliantly entertains; it satisfies".

While taking a climbing holiday in North Wales, David Fraser encounters his old wartime comrade Colonel Drexel.

Drexel wants him to go to Southern France for him to protect a young Arab prince whose country has valuable oil reserves and will sign a treaty once he comes of age.

It was adapted into the British film Masquerade directed by Basil Dearden and starring Cliff Robertson, Jack Hawkins and Marisa Mell.