Flashman on the March (Flashman on the March - George McDonald Fraser)

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Product:	Flashman on the March - George McDonald Fraser
Date:	07/02/07 (103 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Flashman back to his best

Disadvantages: Is this the end?

Flashman on the March - George MacDonald Fraser

There are some books you buy on a recommendation, some you buy on a whim and some you buy because they're by a favourite author. And then there are those that when you see them on the shelf or in an advertisement you immediately stop what you're doing and rush to the nearest bookshop to buy a copy. For me, finding out that there was a new Flashman novel coming off the presses was just one of these momentous occasions.
The previous book (Flashman and the Tiger) had been a collection of three, shortish, stories and many fans took this as a sign that the well was dry and we'd seen all we were going to see of Flashman. This book knocks that idea for six and delivers a vintage Flashman tale.

In the 1960's Fraser had an idea for a book. A keen student of history, both military and social, he wanted to write an adventure story and set it in the Victorian age using the British Empire and other world events as a backdrop, all he needed was a focal point. He was reminded of a book he'd read as a child: 'Tom Brown's Schooldays' and a character who first appeared there. In that book Flashman is a minor character, a coward and a bully who terrorises weaker pupils but likewise lives in fear of those more powerful than himself and is ultimately expelled at age 17 for being 'beastly drunk'. This would have been perfectly timed in the mid 1830's at the dawning of the Victorian age and the unsavoury character Thomas Hughes had created clearly appealed to Fraser's sense of fun and provided a delightful counterpoint to the age's tales of heroes and ripping yarns.

In creating the Flashman stories Fraser uses the popular literary device of false documents. This is where the author will make reference to source material (in this case diary packets) as if they were real to give the audience the impression that they are reading factual history. This is exacerbated by tying the hero to actual historical events and people. So effective was this that when the first Flashman book was published in the US several academic critics took it to be a genuine memoir and reviewed it as such.

This is the twelfth novel in the Flashman series and again sees him at the centre of events on the edges of the British Empire. On this occasion he is railroaded into the little known excursion into Abyssinia in 1867; to rescue British prisoners held by local tyrant King Theodore. The manner of Flashman's involvement in this venture, and his conduct throughout is classic Flashy - That is he takes on the commission to avoid an angry husband and is never more than a self serving cad at all times. But we wouldn't have it any other way and this book delivers everything a Flashman fan would want and then some. A problem with some of the later books was that Fraser spent a lot of time and energy locating Flashman at the scene of so many events and in the company of so many historical figures that the narrative flow became laboured. Part of this was of the authors own making. For an early publication in America Fraser was asked to create a Who's Who entry for Flashman; this he did with relish, listing several column inches worth of decorations and historical activity. Unfortunately he didn't apply the same rigorous research to this as he does to his novels and Flashman was occasionally placed on different continents almost concurrently. Given that global travel in the nineteenth century was measured in weeks rather than days, or even hours, this has caused some problems in trying to fit everything in. Thankfully, this book avoids these pitfalls. Having found a gap in Flashy's diary Fraser has the freedom to tell the story in all its glory.
That story, in a nutshell, is as follows: Following a hasty escape from a bloody coup in Mexico Flashman is persuaded to deliver several cases of silver dollars to fund General Napier's incursion into Abyssinia. On meeting up with Napier he is further pressed into duty to go undercover and up country to obtain the military support of a tribal queen. As the book cover's blurb explains: in a land of fierce warriors and 'de-balocking Amazons' his mastery of 'lechery, treachery and poltroonery will be put to the ultimate test'.

Fraser's attention to detail is impressive, he goes to extraordinary lengths to give the narrative a level of period detail way beyond what a reader could legitimately expect. Look at this brief, and largely inconsequential, extract:

Flashman is being held under guard while awaiting an audience with the queen of the Gallas, in handing over his revolver he gives a quick display of gunslinger skills and immediately wins over the watching soldiers; "Style, you see … and I tipped my metaphorical hat in memory of dear old Lou Maxwell who'd taught me how to spin a gun in Las Vegas all those years ago." In the footnotes he explains who Maxwell is (an associate of Kit Carson) and the fact that this Las Vegas is not the gambling resort but an older settlement in New Mexico.

He could just as easily have said that Flashman had learnt this 'in America' but that level of detail is at the heart of what makes these Flashman books so enjoyable.

There are two things that Fraser does especially well in these books. In fact, there are many things he does well but two that stand out are his enthusiasm when describing battles and the indecent pleasure he takes in recounting the more dastardly acts of Flashman's self-preserving caddishness. As a former soldier and sometime historian, Fraser's skill in describing battles is matched only by his clear admiration for the soldiers involved. In this volume the main military engagement occurs as Napier's army approaches the fortress at Magdala, a minor event in world history but described with relish and an eye for detail. The way in which he describes the destructive attack of the Indian infantry leaves no doubt as to his total respect for them as fighting men: "There's no better hand-to-hand fighter than a Sikh with his bayonet fixed; they scattered the spearmen like chaff and charged on."

The Flashman books may not be to everyone's taste, his behaviour is unremittingly indefensible and his language colourful (although presumably accurate for the times), but as an unashamed fan I can see no wrong in them. I've never come across another character like him and I've never found another series of books I can read and reread so many times without tiring of them. According to Wikipedia, back in 2006 Fraser was planning another Flashman outing - we can only hope.

Summary: The old bugger is back