Sharpe's Havoc

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Bernard Cornwell

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Pages: 369 (Paperback)

ISBN: 0007120125

Pub: HarperCollins Publishers Ltd

Pub date: 2004-03-29

Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 3393

Editorial Review:

One thing is as sure as death and taxes: that each successive Bernard Cornwell novel will be as exhilarating as its predecessor. Sharpe's Havoc continues the trend, demonstrating once again why the Richard Sharpe books by Cornwell are among the most cherished examples of historical derring-do around. While the novels are all assiduously detailed, with a precise sense of period, Cornwell knows how essential it is that his hero, the danger-prone Richard Sharpe, is as vividly characterised as ever. True to form, in Sharpe's Havoc we never lose sight of the character of the protagonist and the many members of the idiosyncratic supporting cast.
This time, we are taken to the spring of 1809 when a few British soldiers are stationed in Lisbon as Marshal Soult undertakes his assault on the garrison of Northern Portugal. It's not for Sharpe and his trusty crew of riflemen to dwell on the finer points of politics when they are sent into the city of Oporto to save the lives of two British women who have elected to stay. But when one of the women, Kate Savage, goes missing, Sharpe (along with Sergeant Patrick Harper and several battle-hardened colleagues) finds himself besieged in the city when the bridge over the river falls to the enemy. The English are forced on in a desperate journey back to the safety of the British encampment, but things become very murky when an enigmatic English officer informs them that they will be staying in the hellhole that is Northern Portugal.

Cornwell admirers will know exactly what to expect, and all the heady pleasures that distinguished such earlier books as Sharpe's Battle and Sharpe's Company are fully in place here, with the added impetus that comes from a notably picaresque narrative. All the central characters are drawn with the customary forcefulness, and instead of the expected tension and release that is the hallmark of most Cornwell novels, there's a steadily increasing excitement engendered here that leads to an all-stops-out finale. --Barry Forshaw

Reader Reviews:

Sharpe's Havoc Audio Book CD (0/0 people found this helpful)

Susannah's husband here. Having read all the Sharpe series I was looking forward to the audio book. Big mistake! The book itself is great for fans needing a Sharpe fix but to listen to McGann or whatever his name is almost drove me to sleep, which wasn't good as I was listening whilst driving in the car. The book is trashed by the narrator who sounds so bored or tired you can almost feel sorry for him. There's no inflection and he just drones on and on, (you can almost hear him sigh at the end of each sentence, that's if you can actually make out the last words he utters). He starts each sentence ok but his volume tails off as if we're keeping awake.......sorry about that, I only bought the CD, HELPED PAY TOWARDS YOUR FEE. Idea for the next audio book.......get someone who actually wants to read the book and preferably has a pulse. Bernard deserves better than this. Paul

"Wall to wall dead Frenchmen" (5/5 people found this helpful)

Someone once summarised the essence of a Richard Sharpe novel as "wall to wall dead Frenchmen" and there is truth in this. After all they are (mostly) set in the Napoleonic War and killing Frenchmen is what Sharpe and his fellow soldiers are there to do. But Bernard Cornwell's books about the up-from-the-ranks rifleman will also feature a plot which requires Sharpe to use all his ingenuity and bravery to succeed against the odds, a woman in distress whom Sharpe must rescue, and a villain, from within his own side but usually of a higher class, whom Sharpe must outwit and (perhaps) kill.

"Sharpe's Havoc" has all the ingredients but in a well-developed way. The military clashes are well-observed and in line with historical fact (apart from the insertion of Sharpe, of course), and there is a deeper sense of the comradeship of the riflemen and of what war does to people than some of the other books, while both the woman and the villain are real people in whom one can take an interest.

It is a bit bloodier than some of the other Sharpe novels, the violence is not caricatured or sanitised, and the general atmosphere is more intense than some. Cornwell's novels can be uneven in their quality (in Amazon terms they vary between 3 and 5 stars) and some were beginning to fear the series was getting a bit tired. This novel has dispelled all such fears.

Sharpe has his revenge (1/1 people found this helpful)

'Sharpe's Havoc' is set in the spring of 1809: the French, under Marshal Soult, have just taken Oporto and now effectively control northern Portugal. During the retreat from Oporto Sharpe and his men from the 95th Rifles find themselves cut off from the British army, and must take to the hills. Meanwhile, rumour has it that Sir Arthur Wellesly (the later Duke of Wellington) is coming out to Portugal to take on the French. But Sharpe has more to worry about than the French as he is confronted with a dubious Colonel Christopher, detached from the Foreign Office...

This is a novel in the best Sharpe-tradition, full of action, nothing too complicated in the plot, and easy to read (it took me slightly more than a day of non-stop reading). The final chapters in the hills of northern Portugal when Sharpe exacts his revenge are among the best I've read so far in any Sharpe-novel.

By the way, if you're planning to read the Sharpe-novels chronologically it's good to know that, contrary to what it says on the inside cover pages of the HarperCollins paperbacks, this novel does not come after but BEFORE 'Sharpe's Eagle' (which is set in July 1809 during the Talavera-campaign).

So now it's on to 'Sharpe's Gold'. I do love the smell of a fresh Sharpe-novel in the morning! ;-)

Very Good (1/1 people found this helpful)

In this outing, Sharpe is in Portugal, during the Peninsular War, in 1809.
The book is fairly much all action, as Sharpe and his men are cut off from the main British force.

There is the usual, beautiful girl, and despicable baddie, that Sharpe has to contend with.

Overall, I thought the book had a very good storyline, and there is rarely a dull moment, in it. If you are interested in the history of that time period, you will probably enjoy it.

The best book yet (3/4 people found this helpful)

All I can say is that I have read all of the Sharpe books and this is by far the best so far...............and the others were brilliant. It just carries you through at breakneck speed with thrills and action throughout. Read it, you won't be disappointed.

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