Len Deighton: Declarations of War (1971)

Edition: Panther, 1973 (Buy from Amazon)
Review number: 1229

This collection of short stories is the only one published by Deighton; I don't know of other, uncollected tales, so this seems to be something of an experiment in his output (as were several other books he published in the early seventies). As the title suggests, they are all war stories, though all of them have something a little unusual about them. The little twists include such ideas as having a story of air combat in the First World War, very much apparently in the style of W.E. Johns, turn out to be about the Germans. (This particular trick is repeated in another story as well, with the added element that student unrest in the thirties is used to evoke the student agitation of the late sixties.)

The stories are all very short, and they are constructed so that the twist is the most important aspect of every one of them (something more commonly considered a feature of science fiction than other genres - though writers like Frederick Forsyth do this frequently in the thriller). All that most of the stories do is set up the situation, then reveal the twist. This makes them a little short of space for characterisation and so they are filled with stereotypes.

The best story in the collection is the first one, It Must Have Been Two Other Fellows, which has a premise rather similar to the song I Remember It Well. Two men meet in a garage where one is working on his car in his spare time after the Second World War, and they recognise each other - they were together in a tank action in North Africa. Or were they? As they reminisce about it, it becomes clear that their memories of what happened are mutually contradictory. So the reader is left guessing whether they are remembering different, yet similar, events, their mutual recognition being a mistake; or whether the War was a time that neither remembers clearly, even its most exciting moments.

Generally, though, these stories are fun to read once and individually. They do pall a bit read all in one go, even though, as no prior publication details are given, the assumption is that they were intended to form part of this collection from their conception. They are too similar to feel inventive to anyone who reads all the way through, and I was left, as someone who has now read them twice, feeling that Deighton is a novelist trying a little too hard at the unfamiliar craft of short story writing.

Lucius Shepard: Life During Wartime (1988)

Edition: Grafton, 1988
Review number: 865

The central character of Shepard's second novel, David Minghella, is an American soldier in a pointless jungle war, this one in Guatemala rather than Vietnam. The mind powers of the Psicorps play an important part in the fighting, but Minghella won't volunteer when he passes their tests. A meeting with a beautiful psychic woman changes his mind, and after his training he discovers that the war isn't what it seems; it is actually part of a centuries old feud between two families of psychics.

The novel is about American imperialism, about the sort of war that might have come out of the Contra rebellion in Nicaragua. Seen from Minghella's viewpoint, what Life During Wartime has to say is definitely from the American side, if one which is not jingoistic, and is more about his suffering and that of his comrades than the former inhabitants of the deserted villages. The psychological effect that the Vietnam War had on many of its American veterans is obviously the inspiration behind the chilling descriptions of the zombie-like armies of those who have had their minds destroyed by too much psychic manipulation.

By using the genre to say something about the effects of war and the nature of American imperialism which could not be said in a traditional narrative, Shepard has created one of the more interesting and thoughtful science fiction novels of the eighties. He didn't go on to become the major nineties author - at least, not that I noticed - that many fans expected at the time; a pity.

Alan Furst: Red Gold (1999)

Edition: HarperCollins, 1999
Review number: 740

Following on from The World At Night, Red Gold continues to chronicle the exploits of Hugh Casson, one time film producer, as he becomes reluctantly involved with the various anti-German factions of occupied Paris. While definitely wanting the Germans ruling France, Casson is not a hero and probably would have kept his head down and stayed far away from de Gaullists, disgruntled Vichy Regime secret service and certainly the Communists if circumstances has allowed.

As in The World at Night, two components of Red Gold lift it above the usual level of Resistance thrillers: the characterisation of Casson and the atmospheric depiction of wartime France. Red Gold is basically more of the same, as you might expect of a sequel; The World at Night set a high standard which is maintained here.

Alan Furst: The World at Night (1996)

Edition: HarperCollins, 1997
Review number: 580

A French film producer in Paris at the time of the German occupation, the only thing Jean-Luc Casson wants to do is to continue making films, in the same way that millions of other French people wanted to continue their normal lives. Despite his best efforts, he manages to get involved with the Resistance and with the German counter-Resistance, and at the same time falls in love.

A thriller about the French Resistance is nothing new, and neither is the idea of a reluctant hero, a normal person who doesn't want to get involved. Both of these aspects of the novel are very well done. Casson is a believable central character, and the Parisian background is convincing, feeling very French. It is clear that Furst is indebted to writers like Eric Ambler and Georges Simenon, but that is hardly a problem. Just to read this novel is enough to convince me that Furst is one of the best thriller authors writing today.

C.S. Forester: The Ship (1943)

Edition: Penguin, 1970

Forester's wartime novel is fairly unashamedly a piece of propaganda, designed to make British readers proud of the efforts of the Navy. He spent some time sailing with the Navy in the Mediterranean, and this novel is based on what he saw.

What he has written is an account of a battle, each chapter heading being a phrase taken from the Captain's report sent to the Admiralty afterward. The novel is unusual among naval stories for the attention that it pays to the ordinary rank and file, including the commissary side (vitally important, of course, in a real war, but not very glamorous). Few stories make it out of the wardroom, let alone into the kitchen. Each person is allowed the chance to be a hero in his own way (the crew is men only at this date), from the captain to the most unreliable Ordinary Seaman.

The fact that each character (except, of course, the Italian officers on the ships that attack them) is allowed to be a hero is the reason that this book is propaganda not literature. It is intended to make those at home proud of the Navy, and to get them to work hard to further the war effort. This is why the action described is a crucial victory; this is why each man is a vital cog in a smoothly running machine. In 1943, it is necessary to have some realism in a description of a battle; Forester does not write about an action won by the heroism of one man, nor does he ignore the possibility of death, disfigurement and disability; he even allows feelings of cowardice (though these must be overcome). The book must have, for many readers, achieved its purpose, which was to encourage everyone who read it that their effort was important to the successful conclusion of the war.

C.S. Forester: The General (1936)

Edition: Penguin
Review number: 217

Forester's early novel is a succinctly told story of a fiction First World War general, Sir Herbert Curzon, from his days as a young officer in the Boer War to an ageing, bathchair-bound figure on Bournemouth Promenade.

Forester does not allow himself a great deal of space to develop his story, under two hundred pages in fact, so we are left with a fairly sketchy view of Curzon's life and character. His story concentrates on the Great War, and what he is mainly concerned to portray are the background and motivation of the men whose actions led to the death of millions.

Curzon is in no way a monster; the worst that can be said of him is that he is not terribly bright, that he's stubborn, unimaginative and conservative. These are in fact attributes which make him do rather well in the British Army of the 1900s, but they lead straight to the dreadful events of the War.

Our understanding of how generals like Curzon managed to act in the way they did is the major fascination of this book, and the way that Forester has written it keeps this aspect in mind in a fairly subtle kind of way. He is not out to depict the brutal horrors experienced by the front-line soldiers but to catalogue why and how men who were not evil made these things happen to them.