What a bizarre Graham Greene novel, and
surely one that, had it not been for the wonderful place that was Books for
Free in Stratford, I would have never picked up…
Out of all the books by Greene that I have
read, this is the first one to be set in England (yes, I know he wrote plenty
of other novels set here, I just haven’t read them…). Despite being familiar
with so many (almost all?) of the corners of London that he describes, I found
these to be so far away from me because of their perceivable bleakness and eeriness.
It’s a Battlefield is an extremely interesting book, despite the fact
that all the important characters are not just unlikable, but fundamentally
plain awful (and rather miserable). However, it’s quite a shame that Greene
never gives Drover a chance to speak ( after all the prisoner is by far the
most enigmatic and interesting character in the novel, with his attempted
suicide after avoiding a death sentence being one of the best plot-twists I’ve
ever come across)
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