Hervey Allen (1899–1949)

This book was published in the 1930's, but took place in about the 1830's. The themes of these 9 volumes (I have a 2 volume set in which all volumes are contained) are: slavery, personal responsibility, ruggedness, and faith. Anthony surely had struggles in his life, which he overcame. I'm sure this book would be considered racist today what with almost every volume centering on the slave trade when it was legal and smuggling when it was not. Although, our hero, Anthony, was anti-slavery and even bought up the slaves not sold at the market because of a "defect" and kept them employed at his mansion so they would have an easier life. Ditto for Father Francois, who cared for the children left as orphans after a slave round-up. This 1238 page omnibus was also not short of romance, as Anthony marries twice and has liaisons in between. At times I thought it was going to be a great book and at times I thought it was a stinker. 1238 pages… (més)

TOWARD THE FLAME has been on my shelf for more than a dozen years now, and I have started to read it and put it down several times. Last night I finally finished reading it, but it was something of a chore. The jacket copy says the book was "Considered by many to be the finest American combat memoir of the First World War," but I found it tedious, repetitive and fragmented, and then it simply ended abruptly, almost 'in media res.' Allen was a platoon leader with the 28th Division, and his story covers just a couple of months, July and August, 1918.

Yes, it is very descriptive of both the fatigue, boredom and sudden horror of war, but it appears that Harvey Allen took very little pains to craft his story into a coherent narrative or to try to draw any conclusions from his experience. Indeed, Allen has this to say in his preface -

"It is a narrative, plain, unvarnished, without heroics and true ... It gives a glimpse of some of the fighting about Chateau-Thierry and Fismes, but above all, it shows how we lived and died, ate, cooked, looked, thought and felt during this time . .. The book is not propaganda of any kind. It is much more than that; it is a picture of war, broken off when the film burned out."

I have the utmost respect for Allen, who went on to write many books, including a bestseller, ANTHONY ADVERSE, but the fact that it took me several tries to finish TOWARD THE FLAME, perhaps suggests it could use a touch more 'varnish.' I will, however, recommend it to war lit buffs, if only for its gritty detail and authenticity.

- Tim Bazzett, author of the memoir, BOOKLOVER… (més)

Action at Aquila, published in 1938 is an historical novel, and a semi-romance, taking place in and around the Shenandoah Valley during the last months of the American Civil War. Allen was a well-known author in his day, and I guess is mostly remembered today as the author of Anthony Adverse. Colonel Nathaniel Franklin is a Union Army officer, commander of the 6th Pennsylvania Cavalry. As the story opens, Franklin is on leave from his command. He returns home but is dismayed by the harsh attitudes that have developed against the Confederacy among the uninformed (in Franklin's view) non-combatants, there. So he leaves to undertake a 3-week wandering journey across southern Pennsylvania and then down into Virginia to eventually return to his men as Sheridan finished the job of clearing the last of the Confederate forces from the Shenandoah.

During Franklin's journey, we get some very good natural descriptions of this beautiful part of the U.S. Also, we learn of the experiences of the Pennsylvanians who have recently lived through Lee's invasion on his way to Gettysburg and then the Confederates' retreat after their defeat in that battle. Allen makes clear that, other than their resentment at having their towns and houses burned, the local inhabitants grudge against the Confederates was not slavery but secession. Eventually Franklin gets back to his troop. In the meantime, we have been introduced to several secondary characters. Franklin's relationships with these characters largely informs the narrative, mostly in ways that are predictable but enjoyable. The battle that Franklin is plunged into upon his return (the "action" of the title) is described in horrific detail. The honor of the soldiers on both sides may be romanticized, but war, in the actual event, is certainly not. It is a bloody and mostly futile business.

The reason I refer to the book as a semi-romance is that most of the interactions between character are predictable in ways you would expect from a romance. But the high quality of the physical descriptions of the countryside, and the historical representations of the setting and action, raise the novel significantly above the negative connotations of the "romance" genre. My copy of the book is a first edition hardcover missing its dust jacket. So I had to go online to find a couple of contemporary reviews (Kirkus and the NY Times) to learn that Allen claimed his information about the attitudes and actions of populace he was writing about came from years of research and conversations with people who remembered the times, or their children. Allen was writing roughly 70 years after events, approximate to someone today writing about World War Two.

Despite the somewhat predictable nature of some of the relationships, here, we do come to care about the characters all in all, and the narrative itself is well presented and Allen's writing is very strong. So while this is not at the very highest level of historical novel that contemporary readers might wish for, I did enjoy the book quite a lot. The attitudes expressed by the characters are, similarly, not sentiments we'd wish our protagonists to have, but I do think they are probably accurate to the time. Finally, through Allen himself, we get whispers of how Americans in the 1930s stood on some of these issues, as well.… (més)