Reviews for Quartered Safe Out Here: A Harrowing Tale of World War II

The average rating for Quartered Safe Out Here: A Harrowing Tale of World War II based on 2 reviews is 5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2011-12-30 00:00:00 Renee Wartman There are a few personal accounts of war and its impact on a man that stand out in the sea of such literature -- works such as Goodbye to All That, Homage to Catalonia, and The Men I Killed. Quartered Safe Out Here has now joined that short list. MacDonald Fraser is the acclaimed author of the Flashman series of historical fiction, but here he reveals his own experience as an infantryman in merciless combat against the Japanese in Burma. Here is an all-too-vivid recollection of the fear, pain, discomfort and -- yes -- the pleasure of comradeship among the common soldiers who win or lose ALL wars. MacDonald Fraser reminds us that wars are not just "politics by other means," wars are about young men -- their lives, their deaths, and their friendships. As one reviewer said, MacDonald Fraser "has raised a memorial" with this book.

Review # 2 was written on 2018-08-15 00:00:00 Donna Williams This is, hands down, the best first person account of war in the China-Burma-India Theater in WW2. Written by the author of the Flashman historical novels, it benefits greatly from Mr. Fraser's talents as a fiction writer, but it's all true. Fraser described his service in General Slim's Army in Burma as the "last echo of Kipling's world", and that is not so far off the mark. Having served in infantry units myself, I felt the truth of this account in my bones. The strange decisions the soldiers had to make, like whether to shoot Japanese soldiers while sleeping, or to wake them up first, are the reality of the grunt's world (they decided it didn't matter much, one way or the other). Fraser is brutally honest, as when he describes being in the last battle of the war, in which, finally, the invisible enemy became visible. His battalion had spent months being shot at and losing men in the jungle, by Japanese who melted away in the forest, and finally they were fighting in the open; he tells of his happiness in being able to finally see and shoot the enemy. And yet, Fraser and his comrades were not blood-thirsty; few soldiers are, and those that are, are usually poor soldiers. They were there to do a job and get out alive, and that's how most soldiers feel. Not for the faint of heart, but so truthful in its description of the combat infantryman's world. If you have not encountered Mr. Fraser in the Flashman series, you should do so. Flashman, Royal Flash, and etc, etc. Some very funny stuff there, but his memoir of the war in Burma is another thing altogether; funny, but tragic, and true.