George MacDonald Fraser (1925–2008)

For starters, Harry Flashman is expelled from school as a drunken bully. After seducing his father's mistress, he begins a secret life that leads from the boudoirs and bordellos of Victorian England to the erotic frontiers of her exotic Empire. Along the way he lies, cheats, steals, fights fixed duels, betrays his country and proves a coward on the battlefield.

Let's face it: Flashman is not really a nice guy. He's a bully, a coward, a rapist, a racist and a drunk. His survival instinct means that he manages to get out of scrapes that can (and does) kill everyone around him. People around him mistake his cowardice, and resulting survival against all odds, as some form of heroism.

Kicked out of Rugby, and having been blackmailed from one regiment to the next after marrying one of his conquests, he ends up in Afghanistan in the late 19th century - at a time when the British are to make one of their more ignoble retreats back to India. Whole regiments are slaugtered around Flashman, due in no small part to the incompitence of the officers around him. [written in 1969, decades before 9/11, this is a fictional illustration of why the West will never win in Afghanistan and would be lucky to come out with a draw].

Did get a bit bored with the tediously long chapters and the constant battles, so not sure I'd like to read a sequel.… (more)

Nihilistic pulp of limited merit or use. Knowledgeably & well enough written, but we read adventure novels notably for the vicarious delight of seeing a hero (= imagining ourselves) “take charge” against hostile situations which threaten him on the most existential level. So it’s *very* blue-balling, & quickly repetitive after some initial amusement, to have patiently to read through the very opposite reaction again & again.

Two satisfying exceptions: The snake pit, where the protagonist (having little choice) shows himself unusually resolute & lethal. & the ending, where he suffers some subtly crafted & humorous consequences for his overall behaviour via two final - cushioned, even cushy, but irreversibly humiliating - developments.

Still. Hardly time optimally spent & I largely regret it.… (more)

After having read the twelve Flashman novels and enjoying them immensely, I order this book along with Pyrates, Black Ajax and Mr. American, penned by the same author, to complete the George McDonald Fraser book of work

Unlike most of Fraser’s work, this is non-fiction. The only other non-fiction work of Fraser’s is Steel Bonnets, a book that I found thoroughly unreadable. This book, which details the author’s World War II service in Burma, was significantly better, though not extraordinary by any means.

While I can highly recommend the author’s Flashman body of work, I found most of his other books to be far below the standard set by Flashman.… (more)