True Soldier Gentlemen
This book is to be the first in a series following a group of young British officers through the Peninsular War to Waterloo.
The prologue is vivid and violent, as would-be artist William Hanley escapes the May massacres in Madrid in 1808 and returns home to take up his commission in the 106th Grenadiers, where his fellow officers include the raffish Billy Pringle, the “gentleman volunteer” Hamish Williams, and one Lieutenant Wickham, who has strayed in from the pages of Pride and Prejudice.
The action then seems to stall. We are introduced to a multitude of subsidiary characters and historical figures, and get to know almost everyone’s backstory. Viewpoint and locations shift wildly. The details of drill, kit and training are meticulous – the author clearly knows and loves his subject – but the amount of detail tends to bog down plot development.
Finally, our heroes are deployed to Portugal and the action takes off with a proper tale of derring-do as they battle the French and encounter the ruthless Russian, Count Denilov, and Maria, a feisty Portuguese courtesan. Love interest is also provided in the shape of Jane MacAndrews, their CO’s daughter.
The slow start was a great shame and the shifts in viewpoint and location hampered the main thrust of the story. Of our heroes, the devout, maladroit Williams was the most unusual and appealing. The presence of Wickham I found a distraction. I must admit I prefer Jane Austen’s characters to remain within the confines of the original novels.
