First published in French in 1934, Roger Vercel's CAPTAIN CONAN appeared in English the following year and has since become recognized as a classic of the Great War. I would rank it up there with A FAREWELL TO ARMS and ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT. This lesser known novel gives us the French Army on the Balkan Front in the closing days of the war. The narrator is young Lt Andre Norbert, pushed into the role of Judge Advocate General, tasked with investigating and trying French soldiers accused of crimes in Bucharest and Sofia following the Armistice. His friend, Lt (and then Captain) Conan, is a much decorated leader of a commando unit, who has little use for orders or regulations, having found his niche as a trained killer. Conan and some of his men run rampant in the peacetime establishments of Bucharest, robbing,terrorizing and even killing civilians. They are arrested. Norbert resigns his JAG position and returns to his infantry unit, unwilling to prosecute his friend, knowing he is guilty. He is also sick at heart about another young soldier sentenced to death for desertion.

Norbert's unit is deployed to a position on the Dnestr River, defending against the Russian Red Army, their former Allies, who are now determined to lay claim to Ukrainian territory. (An especially ironic turn of events, given today's real world events more than a hundred years later.) Conan, his men, the deserter and other prisoners are being held in a nearby makeshift prison. A climactic battle between the French and Russians in and around the river reveals further nuances in the meanings of loyalty and brotherhood.

The book's final chapter acts as an epilogue, with its encounter between Norbert and a much-changed Conan several years later. It nearly broke my heart.

The novel succeeds on many levels: for its multidimensional characters, its historical value, and, probably more than anything, as an anti-war statement about how some battle heroes, returned to civilian life, can no longer fit in, and may even become social pariahs. CAPTAIN CONAN deserves a place among war lit classics. Very very highly recommended.

- Tim Bazzett, author of the Cold War memoir, SOLDIER BOY: AT PLAY IN THE ASA ( )