Sunday, April 19, 2015

Book Review: Sharpe’s Gold by Bernard Cornwell





Published: 1993
Chronology: Richard Sharpe #9
Genre: Historical fiction, war, Napoleonic Era 

Kitch’s Rating: 6.5/10

SPOILERS AHEAD

It’s 1809 and despite the fact that Richard Sharpe captured a French eagle at Talavera (a battle that the British won decisively) the war is still going badly for the British armies under the command of the Duke of Wellington, Sir Arthur Wellesley. He isn’t getting much help from his Spanish and Portuguese allies, and a French army, led by Marshal Massena, is getting ready to encircle the fortress-town of Almeida.

Fresh from a confrontation with a snooty provost, Sharpe, his green-jacketed rifleman, Lieutenant Knowles and the redcoats who make up the balance of the South Essex light company are sent on a dangerous mission to retrieve some gold that Wellington says – without actually saying why – is vitally important to the war effort. Without it, there will be another British retreat, so Sharpe must bring it back, or else, calamity. He is obviously the right and ruthless man for the job.

Unfortunately for Sharpe, the gold rightfully belongs to the Spanish and must be stolen from a dangerous partisan leader named El Catolico, a man of rare violence and, almost immediately, a gentleman you know is going to rub Sharpe the wrong way. Also making Sharpe’s life difficult is Major Kearsey, an exploring officer who clearly has an affinity for the Spanish and who believes that the gold is rightfully theirs.

The partisan of most interest, other than El Catolico, is his bethrohed, Teresa Moreno, a young but well experienced killer who has about as much love for the French as Sharpe does. It doesn’t take a genius to see what’s going to happen: Sharpe wants the girl and he wants the gold, and even El Catolico’s scheming won’t divert him from the task. He’s stubborn, determined, single-minded and necessarily ruthless, too. No wonder Wellington chose Sharpe for the job.

Cornwell’s greatest success with these Sharpe novels (and others, including the excellent Starbuck Chronicles) is that he weaves a fictional narrative into real events, and the pursuit of the gold, the girl and the partisan takes Sharpe and his men to Almeida, which is soon to come under the strenuous attention of French siege guns. There, Sharpe meets more resistance, from a British officer in charge of the defence, and he is ordered to hand the gold over to El Catolico.

Instead, Sharpe comes up with a daring plan that involves the destruction of the town by igniting the ammunition store. In reality, Almeida was blown to smithereens, but the cause remains unknown. Cornwell, as he often does, puts Sharpe right in the middle, and in this fictionalised version of the aborted siege, it is the rifleman who destroys the town in order to keep the gold from El Catolico and take it back to Wellington. Not before a showdown with his partisan nemesis that’s satisfying enough, even though Sharpe is rarely in any danger, given that we’re only about a third of the way into the war and into his exploits.

I’m re-reading the Sharpe novels in chronological order and, so far, this is the one I’ve enjoyed the least. It was one of the first written by Cornwell – which leads to a few plot inconsistences, especially when relating Sharpe’s experiences in India, which differ to the Indian trilogy – and obviously he hasn’t yet expanded the characters like he’s had a chance to do writing prequels and sequels that slot in amongst the original batch. Not to say it’s a bad book, because it isn’t, I just didn’t find it to be as good as Sharpe’s Eagle or my two early favourites, Triumph and Trafalgar. That said, Bernard Cornwell’s worst is better than the absolute best from some authors.

Of course, it’s important in the grand scheme of things, introducing the character of Teresa, and deepening the bond between Sharpe and his constant companion, Sergeant Patrick Harper. Both Harper and Teresa play important roles in the future.

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