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Original Title:	Sharpe's Sword
Edition Language:	English
Series:	Sharpe #14, Richard Sharpe #4
Characters:	Richard Sharpe, Patrick Harper, Michael Hogan, Philippe Leroux, Thomas Leroy, La Marquesa, Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington
Setting:	Salamanca,1810(Spain)

Sharpe's Sword (Sharpe #14)

Bernard Cornwell

Paperback | Pages: 320 pages

Rating: 4.22 | 8227 Users | 180 Reviews

List Containing Books Sharpe's Sword (Sharpe #14)

Title	:	Sharpe's Sword (Sharpe #14)
Author	:	Bernard Cornwell
Book Format	:	Paperback
Book Edition	:	Anniversary Edition
Pages	:	Pages: 320 pages
Published	:	1994 by Harper Collins Publishers (first published 1983)
Categories	:	Historical. Historical Fiction. Fiction. War. Adventure

Narrative During Books Sharpe's Sword (Sharpe #14)

[7/10]


None of the Sharpe books is bad. They present history in a thrilling, heroic manner following the career of Richard Sharpe, a British soldier during the Napoleonic Wars who rises through the ranks thanks to his courage and martial prowess. I must confess though that after reading a fair number of them they tend to blend together in a 'paint-by-numbers' fashion. Cornwell has a winning recipe for cooking his historical romances that he he applies time and time again: Sharpe is the perfect soldier. Sharpe comes across a devious adversary. Sharpe meets a beautiful woman and seduces her. Sharpe gets in trouble with his superior officers. Sharpe finally distinguishes himself in one of the major conflicts of the war, almost single-handedly turning the tide of battle.

Richard Sharpe was good at this. He had been doing it for nineteen years, his whole adult life, more, indeed, than half his life, and he wondered if he would ever be good for anything else. Could he make things with his hands? Could he earn a living by growing things, or was he just this? A killer on a battlefield, legitimised by war for which, he knew, he had a talent.

I need something to distinguish between the different episodes, in my quest to read all the Sharpe books chronologically. A new reader can start anywhere without a problem, since the author himself didn't publish the books in chronological order and he took care to make each one viable as a stand-alone adventure. In the present instance, my bookmarks are the sword from the title and the city of Salamanca.

It was a weapon of exquisite craftmanship, a straight-bladed, heavy cavalry sword made by Kligenthal as were most of the cavalry blades, but this sword had been made specially for Leroux by the finest craftsman at Kligenthal. It was longer than most swords, heavier too, for Leroux was a tall, strong man. The blade was beautiful, a sheen of steel in the dappled green light of the wood, and the hilt and guard were made of the same steel. The handle was bound by silver wire, the sword's sole concession to decoration, but despite its plainness, the weapon proclaimed itself as a beautiful, exquisitely balanced killing blade.To hold that sword, Delmas thought, must be to know what King Arthur felt when he slid Excalibur, smooth as grey silk, from the churchyard stone.

Sharpe covets the beautiful weapon from the first moment he lays eyes on it, in the hands of a captured French officer. The quest is started when this officer, a dangerous killing machine named Colonel Leroux, breaks his parole, kills a couple of Sharpe's friends and escapes into the besieged city of Salamanca. The hunt for the sword is on!

The city of Salamanca is well worth a visit today, and not only in order to see the site of an old battleground. Cornwell did his research well (as usual), and makes it easier for the reader to go sightseeing in the old university quarter, in the magnificent central plaza, in the palaces of the wealthy and in the local monasteries. The action moves briskly between these locations, culminating with an assault on three fortified positions within the town. An important sidequest deals with a hunt for the best English spy in the peninsula, a secret agent nicknamed El Mirador. Another sidequest deals with the usual love interest for Sharpe, the beautiful and rich Marquesa de Casares el Grande y Melida Sadaba. The competition here comes in the guise of a dissolute Irish noble, Captain Lord Jack Spears, one of the 'official' spies in Wellington's army, the kind that goes behind enemy lines in uniform.

The final confrontation of the Salamanca campaign takes place outside the city limits and is one of the largest and bloodiest so far in the series. Cornwell is in his element here, painting a clear picture of the opposing forces and of the deciding large scale maneuvers, filling in the big picture with detailed accounts of individual acts of valor. He is still favoring the British side with most of the praise, and I guess I need to find a French author if I want to discover what the French think about the whole Spanish campaign. For now Wellington gets the lion's share of the glory.

Sharpe comes out well out of the scramble, not surprisingly since I know how many more books are left in the series. The author did put him through the mangler here to a higher degree than usual (view spoiler)[ He was left for dead after being shot in the lower abdomen (hide spoiler)]. Leroux was a strong adversary, and the sideplots better handled than usual, especially the resolution of the quest for the Kligenthal sword. What I'm trying to say is that I might have given only three stars to the Salamanca episode, but this is mostly because I am already too familiar with the formula. For a new reader who only starts with the Sharpe novels, this one could go four stars or more.

I will continue with the Cornwell series. I am even considering stepping up the rhythm to more than a couple of books each year, because I really want to explore different historical subjects and I want to get to the finish line quicker with the current one.

Rating Containing Books Sharpe's Sword (Sharpe #14)

Ratings: 4.22 From 8227 Users | 180 Reviews

Judge Containing Books Sharpe's Sword (Sharpe #14)

My eighth Sharpe book still follows the same formula but I just love them all the more.Set in the summer of 1812, the life of Britains most important spy is at stake. Sharpe has been given the task of ensuring their safety by finding the dangerous Colonel Philippe Leroux, who knows the identity of the spy and will stop at nothing to silence them. A cast of characters including the lovely Hélène, La Marquesa de Casares el Grande y Melida Sadaba (no Sharpe novel would be complete without a

I'm finding that Cornwell is an author you cannot go wrong with. It is this kind of book, this kind of thoughtful, imaginative author that gives life to history. Meticulous research, no glossing over of ugliness, and adding personality to happenings make this an excellent read. If the American education system would meld this kind of learning with history, so much more history would be learned. I never realized how much I liked history, and how much strategy one can learn, with books like this.

Or ... "Richard Sharpe gets badly wounded"(currently) chronologically the 14th entry in Bernard Cornwell's long-running Sharpe series, this was the 4th book published, and takes place during the Salamanca campaign.In a departure from the (then) previous 3 books, this is also largely set in the spy-world, with Richard Sharpe (the soldier) assigned to protect the identity of Britain's most important spy: an identity which has been uncovered by the ruthless Col Leroux, who breaks his parole (and

I'm finding that Cornwell is an author you cannot go wrong with. It is this kind of book, this kind of thoughtful, imaginative author that gives life to history. Meticulous research, no glossing over of ugliness, and adding personality to happenings make this an excellent read. If the American education system would meld this kind of learning with history, so much more history would be learned. I never realized how much I liked history, and how much strategy one can learn, with books like this.

I am an unabashed Richard Sharpe fan and Bernard Cornwell fan.In this episode, built around the battle of Salamanca, Sharpe encounters the evil Colonel Leroux, France's most ruthless assassin. In the process of trying to capture Leroux and appropriate his highly valued sword, he becomes romantically involved with LaMarquesa, an extraordinarily beautiful woman whose interest in Sharpe is not purely romantic.As always, Sharpe, while almost dying from a gunshot wound, eventually figures it all out

Having read many Sharpe stories years ago I was hoping to reignite my fascination and appreciation for these Napoleonic War tales. One of my favorite authors , Bernard Cornwell, did not disappoint me. This story set in Spain during the Peninsular campaigns has it all. Captain Sharpe is rough and tough, but he is bested in a one on one sword fight with the top French "spy-catcher" . Leroux, noted for his diabolical tortures to extract information from the "enemies of the Empire (Napoleon's of

More fighting and seemingly insurmountable problems for Richard Sharpe. This time he's in Salamanca where he gets involved in espionage that unsurprisingly involves a beautiful woman. Sharpe suffers grievous wounding from the owner of the sword in the title, and as ever, provides a lynch pin in turning around a massive battle at the end. And despite being an infantry officer, he's also involved in a cavalry attack on an enemy square. Only Sharpe could have such an illustrious military CV and