Book description
Harry Flashman: the unrepentant bully of Tom Brown's schooldays, now
with a Victoria Cross, has three main talents - horsemanship, facility
with foreign languages and fornication. A reluctant military hero,
Flashman plays a key part in most of the defining military campaigns of
the 19th century, despite trying his utmost to escape them all.
With the mighty Sikh Khalsa, the finest army ever seen in Asia, poised
to invade India and sweep Britannia's ill-guarded empire into the sea,
every able-bodied man was needed to defend the frontier - and one at
least had his answer ready when the Call of Duty came: 'I'll swim in
blood first!'
Alas, though, for poor Flashman, there was no avoiding the terrors of
secret service in the debauched and intrigue-ridden Court of the Punjab,
the attentions of its beautiful nymphomaniac Maharani (not that he
minded that, really), the horrors of its torture chambers or the baleful
influence of the Mountain of Light. Praise for George MacDonald Fraser:
'Thanks to Fraser's passion for history, his rare gift for rattling
narrative and his infectious delight in robust, rollicking language, we
can rejoice in a work of genius worthy of being ranked with - there can
be no higher accolade - P. G. Wodehouse' Daily Telegraph
'As well as providing a fine assortment of treats, George MacDonald
Fraser is a marvellous reporter and a first-rate historical novelist'
Kingsley Amis The author of the famous Flashman Papers and the Private
McAuslan stories, George MacDonald Fraser worked on newspapers in
Britain and Canada. In addition to his novels he also wrote numerous
screenplays, most notably The Three Musketeers, The Four Musketeers, and
the James Bond film, Octopussy.
