SHARPE’S FURY
by Bernard Cornwell
HarperCollins, £17.99
He’s back, and devotees of Richard Sharpe will walk across broken glass to get at his latest tight-trousered, sabre-clashing adventure — Cornwell’s Napoleonic saga has gathered armies of fans. It is 1811. Wellington and his British troops are in Portugal. Sharpe leads an expedition to break a strategically important bridge, but falls foul of a particularly nasty French commander, the gorgeously named Colonel Vandal. Cornwell has a formidable knowledge of military history, yet he never lets it get in the way of a plot that is genuinely thrilling. Traditional yarn-spinning of a high order, and perfect entertainment for armchair warriors.
Advertisement
THIS TIME OF DYING
by Reina James
Portobello Books, £10.99
This author is the daughter of the great Sid James, but there is not a hint of Carry On about her first novel. It is a rich and absorbing story about the 1918 epidemic of Spanish influenza. Henry Speake is a young undertaker, rather cowed by his scary band of sisters. He has coped with mangled bodies sent home from the trenches but is overwhelmed by the dreadful power of the epidemic. In his state of fear and uncertainty he is drawn into a relationship with a schoolteacher who has been recently widowed. A five-star weepie.
Advertisement
THE PERFECT MAN
by Naeem Murr
Heinemann, £14.99
Where to begin? This novel has so many layers, all feeding on the theme of human imperfection and the way that we treat supposed outsiders. Rajiv Travers, the child of an English father and Indian mother, arrives in London in 1947. His father bought his mother from her parents for £20, not realising that she was “simple”. Years later, Raj is living in America with his uncle’s mistress, who writes romantic novels about perfect men. Although he is an outsider, Raj teams up with four local children. A mystery in the town surrounds the death years earlier of an autistic child.