Previews:
Flashman and the Red Baron
Flashman and the Knights of the Sky
Flashman and the Third Reich
1906. Harry Flashman, grandson of the famous Victorian General is about to leave Rugby under a cloud. A chip off the old block, one might say. Perhaps more than he realised. Forced to join the army, up to no good at Sandhurst and sent to India.
1914. India. Bored with garrison life, an unwise gamble leads to a flight in one of these new aeroplanes. As a result, and surprisingly smitten by aviation, Flashman returns to England via Sarajevo, intending to learn to fly. Meanwhile, Europe is convulsed.
Displaying all his charming family traits, he is caught up in the start of the Great War, shanghaied along the way by the head of the fledgling Secret Service. Fighting for his life over the western front in a box of string and dope, sent beyond the lines on reckless missions for C, terrified out of his wits, dashing for cover, deflowering the local maidens, lying, stealing and generally behaving badly, Flashman gives his honest account of his life as an RFC pilot and sometime secret agent. From the birth of aerial fighting, to the first day on the Somme, from dropping bombs on the enemy, to duelling in the skies with Immelmann, from the nocturnal secrets of enemy spies, to murder on the streets of St Omer, Flashman lives up to his family name, emerging quivering but alive and reputation intact from the maelstrom of total war in Europe.
Paul F Moore
Click HERE to go to the Amazon preview
April 1917. Bloody April, when the life expectancy of a fighter pilot on the western front reduced to 17
days, our hero is sent back to France as a flight commander with another mission; to investigate a possible traitor flying with the RFC. Straight back into the action he is quickly confronted with the
appalling attritional reality.
Briefly back in England, his previous escape from Germany comes back to haunt him and he once more finds himself unwillingly preparing for a mission in enemy territory. Terrified beyond description, face to face with some truly dangerous people, Flash finds himself flying with Richtofen's Circus before witnessing the demise of the Baron himself.
Grudgingly in action right up to the Armistice, not all of it strictly military, Flash is present at the end of hostilities. Peace beckons, the quiet life promised just over the horizon. But it is not to be. As Germany descends into anarchy, he is sent back to Munich, to investigate the rise of the Nationalists most of whom appear to be nothing more than tinpot politicians with delusions of grandeur. But not all, and it is with his customary reluctance, red faced with fear that Flashman finds himself enveloped in the bosom - quite literally - of the Nazis and their quest for power, culminating in the 'Beer Hall Putsch and its bloody aftermath.
Victory! Abdication! At last, Flashman gets his own back on the Prince of Wales, now Edward VIII, assisting from cover in his downfall but not before witnessing the Wall Street Crash and the rise to power of the Nazis and their takeover of Germany in 1933. Present at the Reichstag fire, Flashman continues on his merry way weaving in and out of the events that slowly but with ever increasing pace engulfed the world in the second lethal maelstrom of the 20th century.
With his contacts behind the scenes in SIS and with the Deputy Fuhrer, Rudolf Hess, Flashman is caught up in the murky world of peace negotiations, is present for the now Duke of Windsor's infamous tour of Germany in 1937 and the descent to war.
Flitting from one side to the other, neither side entirely convinced of his loyalty to anyone bar himself, he takes part in the 'peace group' negotiations before finding himself back in Germany just after the outbreak of war having been shanghaied by one of the many shady organisations in the Third Reich. Rescued by the larger than life Hermann Goering, he encounters Hanna Reitsch, one of Germany's leading pilots before flying in action for the Luftwaffe AND the RAF in the Battle of France.
Having escaped via the chaos of Dunkirk, he is back in the air for the Battle of Britain, the perhaps defining moment in British Imperial history and its final last stand when the sun really did finally start going down on the Empire.
Battle won, for the moment at least, he finds himself deeply involved with the new head of SIS, Stewart Menzies and his group of high ranking plotters desperately trying to bring peace via the Deputy Fuhrer whose flight to Scotland and subsequent imprisonment causes violent upheaval in the ruling classes, not least the Royal Family. And finally, a Shorts Sunderland from 228 Squadron departs Scotland and crashes killing, officially, all on board including the King's brother, the Duke of Kent.
Who, though, was the extra body?