Quartered Safe Out Here - George MacDonald Fraser

"I'm attacking Pyawbwe by submarine!" (1174 words)
by Jake Speed - written on 23/07/08, updated on 26/07/08 (Very useful, 153 readings)
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Quartered Safe Out Here is the late George MacDonald Fraser s memoir of his time in World War II Burma as a young soldier. As part of Fourteenth Army, Fraser served in Nine Section , a group of eccentric but hard-bitten Cumbrian borderers as they took part in the last great land campaign of World war II. In addition to providing a vivid account of what life was like living and fighting in the jungle, Fraser also looks at modern attitudes to war and contrasts them with the attitudes of his generation. There is also an epilogue which takes place fifty years after the end of the war. The book runs to just under 350 pages and includes one map. "It is satisfying, ...

Royal Flash - George MacDonald Fraser

What Flashy did next (492 words)
by J_Russell - written on 27/12/09 (Very useful, 10 readings)
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Royal Flash is the second volume of the Flashman papers and follows on directly from Flashman. After reading the first volume I was undecided about the merits of the series but after reading Royal Flash I was committed to reading the whole lot. By this stage, you will probably have decided whether or not the books are for you. The obvious criticism of Royal Flash is that the story is not original, but is taken almost directly from The Prisoner of Zenda, with Flashman taking the part of the Hon. Rudolf Rassyndyll. There is therefore less real history in this than in any of the other Flashman stories, though we do encounter two key historical figures, Otto von Bismarck and Lola ...