Polite Dissent

Once again joining somebody else’s bandwagon, I join David and Ed in Book Week and today I promote some of my favorite historical novel series.

The Sharpe Series by Bernard Cornwell
This started out as a series of eleven books that chronicled the fate of British Army infantryman Richard Sharpe through the Napoleonic Wars ending at the battle of Waterloo. Originally a common sergeant, Sharpe saved life of Lord Wellington during a battle in India and found himself promoted to Lieutenant. The stories do an excellent job of bringing the battles to life as well as the harsh life of the British soldier. Cornwell has since gone on to write more Sharpe books set before, after and in-between the original eleven. The BBC also made a very entertaining series of Sharpe movies starring Sean Bean (Boromir in Lord of the Rings). They can sometimes be seen on Masterpiece Theater or the History Channel (and are available on VHS and DVD).

The Hornblower Series by C.S. Forester
Chronicling the adventures of British sailor Horatio Hornblower during the Spanish and Napoleonic Wars. Hornblower starts off as a lowly Midshipman and makes it all the way to Admiral by the end of the series. The best books to start with are Beat To Quarters, Ship of the Line, and Flying Colours. Technically they are the sixth, seventh, and eighth book in the series, but they are the first ones that Forester wrote. They were also turned into an excellent movie starring Gregory Peck and Virginia Mayo. The earlier books were turned into a well done series of movies on A&E starring Ioan Gruffudd as the young Hornblower (Gruffudd is to play Reed Richards in the upcoming Fantastic Four movie). Horatio Hornblower was one of the first popular heroes who broke from the idea of the dashing hero — he was shy, awkward, not particularly handsome and usually scared to death (at least in the earlier books). As a bit of trivia, Forester also wrote The African Queen, later turned into the famous Humphrey Bogart and Katherine Hepburn movie.

Even though it shares a setting with the Hornblower novels, I never enjoyed Patrick O’Brian’s Aubery/Maturin series (Master and Commander is the first book — later turned into the Russel Crowe movie), so I gave up after the fifth book. There was just no joy in reading the books; it wasn’t fun — more like a chore.

Other good historical novels include the Arundel series by Kenneth Roberts and any of James L. Nelson’s various naval series.