Flashman and the Mountain of Light

by George MacDonald Fraser

With this volume, we find Flashy in the Punjab in 1845, witnessing and spying in the first Sikh War (or Rebellion, if you look at it from the British view).  Reading so much Cornwell for the past year made me forget just how good Fraser is.  Cornwell is good, certainly — but this is highly detailed, thoroughly researched historical fiction, managing to be both more of a dramatic page-turner and more erudite than any Sharpe book.  I’ve commented before on Flashy’s growing heroism, and nowhere is it more apparent than in this book, where Flash does actual service to the crown, and is even allowed at the end a bit of real one-upsmanship.  Of course, as he notes, it’s ironic that he gets rewarded for his cowardice, and disdained for something close to skill and bravery in the line of duty.

The American Black Chamber

by Herbert O. Yardley

The author headed the titular Black Chamber, a euphemism for MI-8, the branch of US Intelligence that dealt with ciphers, codes and “secret inks” through WWI and beyond, until the branch was summarily closed by a spectacularly naive and short-sighted Secretary of State.  Hardley is a fine raconteur, detailing step-by-step the painstaking ways he and his staff decoded, for example, messages that were composed solely of long strings of five-digit numbers (which turned out to be references to a dictionary’s page and line numbers).

The decryption of the Japanese codes, too, considering the lack of available information on the language itself, is incredible.  There’s a long stretch of intercepted and translated Japanese telegrams which I suppose Yardley included to make a political point, but which is a bit dreary, when all one wants is more info on how he cracked the codes. Aside from that, it’s fascinating, not only the code breaking but the period detail: how legions of typists and thousands of cards were needed in those days before computers or the level of government spying: letters and cables read as a matter of course, people followed and observed...  And here we are whining about the Patriot Act. 

four stars

Cork Boat

by John Pollack

The author, a former speechwriter for a Congressman and Clinton, quits his job to build a boat made out of 165,000-plus corks held together by rubber bands, which he then sails with friends down the Douro River in Portugal.  It sounds like a fairy tale, and it almost is, a heart-warming true fantasy story of childhood dreams and adult sacrifice and priorities and adventure.  Pollack is, of course, a gifted writer, adept at spinning a tale and interweaving personal reminisces, anecdotes and a few strands of history here and there.  But it’s Pollack's determination and optimism, though, that make this such a sweet tale.  After the descriptions of camaraderie, community, despair and dedication, I felt like cheering along as they pulled into Porto on the final day.

Thy Servant a Dog

by Rudyard Kipling

A novella composed of three long stories, as narrated by Boots, a terrier owned by an affluent British couple in the country.

In the first eponymous story, Boots tells how his master met and married a woman with another terrier named Slippers.  Written in fractured and limited English, the story is a series of the two dogs’ simple adventures, from nipping at cows to rolling in bad smells to welcoming the couple’s new baby.  And they meet Ravager, a hunting hound, who grows from a clumsy puppy to a strong, “dretful” pack leader, but remains their friend.

In “The Great Play Hunt,” Ravager, after being hit by a car and can no longer run with the pack, is given to the now older boy.  The three dogs stage a hunt for the boy’s benefit and pleasure with the collaboration of Tags, a lame, friendly fox.

In “Toby Dog,” they meet a trick dog owned by a cockney con artist; Toby helps the pensioned Ravager get some pride back through his trickery.  All wonderful, funny and heart-warming stories.  But Ravager gets sicker, strains himself, and dies; this would be bad enough, but the book just ends there, with Boots mourning his friend, miserable and not understanding why he will not “unsleep” and why they have put him in dirt like a bone.  A very bleak and abrupt ending to such a joyous series of tales; it made me upset.

The Great Gatsby

by F. Scott Fitzgerald
1925

This was "the authorized text,” with notes, preface and brief biography of the author by Matthew J. Bruccoli.  Nick Carraway narrates the story of James Gatz, a penniless young man of few prospects, who reinvents himself as wealthy James Gatsby in order to capture the heart of Daisy, the woman he loves.  Unfortunately, she is married to Tom, Nick’s cousin; and Nick has his own relationship problems with Jordan, Daisy’s friend.

It’s far more than a soap opera of the smart set, however, as the bare-bones plot synopsis might make it sound.  It’s an intricately plotted, meticulously written, introspective work on seeking the past and to what extent people can reinvent themselves.  It is also an ironic comment on the seedier side of the American dream, the substitution of flashy tawdriness for true greatness, the warping of opportunity into opportunism.  The prose is superb; Fitzgerald has fine-tuned the cadences of American English and written a symphony of words.  Gatsby is an immediately intriguing character, the sympathetic bootlegger and adulterer who seems to want, aside from Daisy, nothing more than to be understood, at least by Nick.

five stars

Flashman's Lady

by Gorge MacDonald Fraser

1977

Flashy — after, incidentally, pulling a hat trick on the three most celebrated cricketers of his time — accepts a "friendly" wager in a single-wicket match against Don Solomon, a half-breed Etonian socialite. The tie score results in he and Elspeth accompanying Solomon on a cruise to the Far East, where Solomon’s true colors are revealed, and he absconds with Elspeth. Flashman must fight, however unwillingly, to get her back — until they both end up in the hands of the bloodthirsty queen of Madagascar, Ranavalona I.

This is a fine entry in the series, possibly a little more heavy on the humor this time around than the adventure. The first half of the book is all cricket and social intrigue; a more thorough look at Madagascar might have been in order, tho' perhaps Fraser was dealing with limited intelligence on that subject. Another minor quibble: At the book’s opening, our hero is caught in a damned-if-he-does-damned-if-he-don’t trap that pushed him again into adventure (lose the cricket match and see Elspeth go on a cruise with Solomon, or win and be beaten by crooked bookies?). And, as in Flash for Freedom!, the dilemma that prompted him into action, when he returns (in that case, cheating at cards), is completely forgotten. I would have liked to see some closure in the matter of the threatening bookie, at least. All that aside, this is, of course, another witty, well-researched adventure. Bravo!  

five stars

Flash For Freedom!

by George MacDonald Fraser

Accused (falsely, amazingly enough) of cheating in a friendly game of cards, Flashy injures the accuser in a rage. His reputation damaged, Flash joins a ship’s crew until the scandal cools down – only to realize to his horror (his own neck being on the line, of course) that it’s a slave ship. Here begin Flashy's adventures on the high seas and America, where at various times he is dragooned and bluffs his way into nearly every role concerning the slave trade: buyer, trader, seller, driver on a plantation, underground railroad smuggler, anti-slavery double agent, almost even a slave himself at one point.

It’s all tremendous stuff, full of the usual (on Fraser's part) erudition and wit and (on Flashy's part) lechery, as well as, of course, the historical tweaking: Flashman meets a young Disraeli, a young Lincoln, and even serves as the inspiration for Harriet Beecher Stowe’s famous book. Superb historical parody, historical fiction, and pure entertainment all in one. Oh, a final thought: Flashy's definitely gotten a lot braver since the first book. Scared or not, it takes guts to pull a gun on a killer, or even keep one's wits enough to play-act in the face of danger. That's most likely a good thing, of course; as a reader, one can take only so much helpless, quivering terror from the narrator.  

five stars