Death or Glory: The Last Commando by Michael Asher
Death or Glory: The Last Commando by Michael Asher
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Tuesday, 19, May 2009 10:19
Published by Penguin, out May 21st, hardback, 487 pp, £12.99.
In a nutshell...
Thrilling, Masculine, Straightforward, Gory, Overlong.
What's it all about?
It is 1942 and the Allied forces are struggling to keep Rommel's Afrika Korps from completing their sweep of Northern Africa. Meanwhile Sergeant Tom Caine and a selection of handpicked soldiers are sent on a seemingly impossible mission behind enemy lines to rescue First Officer Madeleine Rose, aka. Runesfish, whose plane is shot down while she is carrying a vital message to Winston Churchill himself, a message that will change the course of the war. Their chance of survival: 50 per cent at best.
Who's it by?
Michael Asher is a former serviceman, explorer and author whose CV includes the Parachute Regiment, the SAS and the first on-foot West-East crossing of the Sahara, with his wife, Arabist, photographer Mariantonietta Peru and some camels. He has won the Ness Award of the Royal Geographical Society and the Mungo Park Medal of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society for Exploration and is also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. His writing credits include novels such as Rare Earth (2002) and Sandstorm (2003), as well as works of non-fiction such as the acclaimed The Regiment: The Real Story of the SAS (2007) and many newspaper articles for the likes of the Guardian, the Times and the Telegraph.
As an example...
"Caine squeezed iron, tippled streams of .45 calibre left and right at anything that moved. Tracer flew, Jerry small-arms stuttered, rounds blipped across the White's bonnet, bouncing at angles from her armour, whanged and fizzled into the night. Caine saw a German gun-crew working frantically to bring an 88mm gun to bear."
Likelihood of becoming a Hollywood blockbuster
The action-packed nature and fairly simple plot and characters of Death or Glory: The Last Commando actually make it perfectly suited to a Hollywood adaptation. Tom Caine is a straightforward hero of the old-school, a man of action and good deeds, heroic and practical. Very few people will read this book without remembering some of the greatest scenes from such films as Saving Private Ryan, The Thin Red Line or any other film from the bloated but occasionally exciting genre of WWII action blockbusters.
So is it any good?
Death or Glory: The Last Commando is one of those simple pleasures of literature. Asher's extensive knowledge of combat practices, equipment and military history bring a weight of authenticity to the setting of the plot, which has its twists and turns, but the stand-out aspect of the novel is by far the gripping and violent action sequences. In the style of any Hollywood blockbuster, the heroes often seem invincible due to convenient plot devices such as last minute rescues and near impossible feats of physical ability. The characters are paper-thin with many obviously included to be used as cannon fodder for the book's many gory battles.
The graphic depictions of violence will sometimes turn the stomach but will also keep you turning pages as you root for Tom Caine and his men in the same way that you would root for the heroes of any issue of Commando Comics or an Adventure Book for Boys from days of old. The subplot involving the deplorable murderer/rapist/informant character named Eisner will often become tiresome and makes for awkward interludes between the chapters focussing on Caine and his troop, whom most readers will want to spend all their time with.
At 487 pages the novel does overstay its welcome somewhat and the constant barrage of violent skirmishes will eventually become something of a chore, especially with Asher's insistence on detailing the exact model of machine gun being fired at any one time, but an affection for the simple hero of Caine and the few of his men who Asher takes any time detailing will keep readers involved until the end and perhaps excited for further adventures involving these characters, which are apparently on the way.
7/10
Jim Dixon