Sharpe’s Revenge
Such a good book!
I started it yesterday morning whilst Radio made a blog post. I tried maybe a chapter before succumbing to sleep yesterday evening, and then killed the rest of it during today.
The war is over, a vanquished Napoleon forced to abdicate and exiled to Elba.
There has been brilliant progression made with the Sharpe character. In the last book (Sharpe’s Sword) he had become someone who was obsessed with losing a loved one, his fear that Jane had caught the fever never leaving him. By this book, just a few weeks later, he’s become petrified of war, a superstitious mess concerned that the next battle will be his last.
His old enemy, the spymaster Pierre Ducos, has Sharpe set up for stealing the Emperor’s baggage train. He has an officer sign as a witness, then sees to it that this man is killed at just the moment that Sharpe is about to visit him. He already appears guilty because his wife has withdrawn £18,000 in London. Granted, this was money looted from a baggage train, but it’s not the loot in question.
Sharpe’s wife betrays him in other ways. She cheats on him with Lord Rossendale, a man with every incentive to make sure Sharpe doesn’t return.
I’m reluctant to type up story details, just because I’ve written over 3,000 words on this book elsewhere today, but I have to say that I really enjoyed this. The last book was a chore, so much so that I’m actually thinking that I must’ve been off form and so will re-read it, but there were no such problems here. I think I was especially helped by this being all storyline and plot, without the need for talk of escalades and other battle details. Lots of little plot things from previous stories came together to make this a really good and readable adventure.
I’m off to squeeze in the TV version before bed now 
Tags: Bernard Cornwell, Sharpe