Many of his best barbs are reserved for his commanding officer in Afghanistan, General Elphy Bey. Flashy’s observations about his colleagues and the world around him are unvarnished, unflattering, and often hilarious. It’s a combination of historical fiction, scoundrel lit, and dry British humor. I feel like a bit of a heel for saying so, but Fraser’s polished, wonderfully paced, historically accurate story-telling, combined with Flashman’s unique, humorous voice won me over. At every turn, through a combination of luck, quick thinking and timely cowardice, Flashman comes out smelling like a rose and ends this first novel as a famous war hero. In this first installment, we follow Flashy from his schooling disgrace to his Machiavellian career in the Army, during which he travels from Scotland (where he seduces the young daughter of the family he billets with), to India (where he bangs everything with a pulse), to Afghanistan, where he’s a participant in the major events of the First Anglo-Afghan War. The story is framed as a fictional memoir/autobiography told in a series of “papers” discovered to have been written by Flashman when he was very old.
To the enduring credit of George MacDonald Fraser, he manages to weave a funny, engaging historical adventure around this black hole of virtue, one that kept me laughing and turning pages throughout.įlashman follows the exploits of the notorious bully from immediately after his expulsion from Rugby School, as detailed in Tom Brown's Schooldays, from which Fraser borrowed the character. I’m not even docking him for his racism and sexism, for which he gets a "sign-of-the-times" hall pass based on the 19th Century timeline. Get me…not the kind of actions at which it’s easy to give a wink and nod. **Randomly flogging his household servants everyday “for their good and my own amusement.”
**Forcibly selling his Indian concubine to a passing artillery major, because she had become “too and mopish at night to be much fun.”
**Having sex with his Father’s mistress, and then beating and sexually assaulting her when she refuses his subsequent advances. A rapacious, lecherous, despicable scumbag with no redeeming qualities whatsoever. Harry Paget Flashman is NOT your typical morally-challenged but likeable scoundrel who you can’t help but love because of his sharp wit and buckets o’ charm.
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