Three Cheers for Me

This is a terrific, blackly humorous tale. The amazing thing is that the humour - which is everywhere in the book - somehow manages not to obscure the horrors of WWI but blends, apparently effortlessly, with it. The necessity of laughter in horrendous situations is abundantly clear here - as is the gradual fall from innocence of the initially ingenuous Bartholomew Bandy. Great stuff, and I'll be searching out the sequels. I simply can't understand why I'd never heard of this series before!

An interesting and humorous story of an officer from a puritanical rural community in Canada drafted into with the army in WW1. He survives wounded from the battle of the Somme and after recovering in England is transferred to the RFC. Here he finds his element and become an Ace pilot surviving many aero combats and gains rapid promotion. However the stress and dangers that he faces leads to some relaxing of his straight jacketed life. He is also a most unusual autistic sort of character pragmatic and decisive in action but inept and bumbling in his social intercourses. This leads to the most hilarious conversations and incidents that can hardly be imagined. Reading can lead to involuntary bursts of loud laughter. The story leaves the reader wondering what happens next, will the hero survive the rest of the war, will he marry the fiancé that he acquires and how will he cope with married life? Can’t wait to find out.

Bartholomew Bandy is a kind of Candide. As Candide he comes from North America, specifically Canada, seen as a place where a certain honesty of thought survives. The son of a bigoted and sober Pastor, goes to war with his his horse-face and his total social incompetence, which makes him say and do whatever comes into his head with the utmost awkwardness and without a second thought. Among hilarious adventures that look a bit like the mythical Müchausen Baron ones and on the wings of a fortune proportionate only to its incredible clumsiness, Bandy went from infantry lieutenant to ace gunner, in the meantime leading to madness any superior in which he comes into contact and having in the meantime learned to drink and smoke.
First Book of a long and successful series, it caused me crisis of laughter that I did not remember from the days of Three Men in a Boat, which is why I will try to get the other volumes.
Thank Farrago and Netgalley for giving me a free copy in exchange for an honest review.