The Secret War

By MFW Curran

The Secret War by MFW CurranI’ve got several piles of books around the house. There’s the pile of absolute, definite must reads – it’s a short pile because whatever is on it tends to get devoured pretty quickly – then there’s the ‘never-in-a-million-years’ pile of books that, for one reason or another, I’ll never read but will inevitably donate to friends and relatives and then there are the ones in the middle, the “definite maybe’s” and the “hmm..interesting, once I’ve read these other 6 books……” pile and it was into one of these that MFW Curran’s The Secret War had been placed. Unfortunately, amongst the day-to-day hoo-ha of life it seemed to get relegated to a lesser position each day so when I suddenly found myself face-to-face with it and no ‘must have’ book standing between us it was with a certain amount of guilt that I settled in to read it and, now that I have, I can’t believe I waited for so long.

Set in the Aftermath of the Battle of Waterloo the story introduces us to stepbrothers and comrades-in-arms, Captain William Saxon popular with the men, true to King and Country, steadfast and duty bound and Lieutenant Kieran Harte, no less a man than Saxon, but war-weary and convalescing in a French farmhouse in the village of Gembloux following his injuries in battle, and fast falling in love with Katherine, his nurse.

Their post-war plans are put on hold indefinitely following an incident in the small village in which a mysterious small bronze pyramid – The Scarimadean – unleashes a demon and the two men, along with a few remaining soldiers, face it down. Against all odds they eventually kill it but not before it tears its way through several of the locals, Katherine included. In the aftermath of the attack, and the eventual return to England, both men are changed for good, but it’s not until they come into contact with a man named Engrin that they realise just how much their lives will change.

He explains that for centuries a war has been fought between Heaven and Hell, a war where Vampyres and Knights of the church wage constant battles across the world trying to assert control of human kind. In the wake of this knowledge, and to assure the safe destruction of The Scarimadean, the two men find themselves heading to Rome to help the Church in their fight against the demonic forces of Count Ordrane, surviving assassination attempts, Vatican politics, epic battles and more as they try to stem the rising tide of evil flooding across the globe.

At first glance you get the feeling that this will be a po-faced historical fantasy but nothing could be further from the truth. While the history is there, far from overwhelming the story it’s actually pushed to the back in favour of bringing out the fantasy elements that make the story the corker that it is. The action is pretty relentless which makes this a fast-paced read, and the battle scenes, particularly the one aboard the Iberian, are brilliantly portrayed, darkly violent, edge-of-the-seat stuff.

The story is standard fantasy fair, friends have to give up their ordinary lives to transport an ages-old artefact of great power to the place where it can be destroyed, accompanied by an enigmatic old man who knows more than he is letting on but the author does a lot with, never letting the pace slow or the conversation become too expository and introducing characters and plot elements only as they become necessary rather than flooding the pages with them which, despite it’s rich flavour, lends it a sparsity that does nothing but help. The characters are less well realised though, it has to be said. Saxon, in particular, comes across as largely robotic in the early stages of the book, but Curran gently teases each one out a little at a time to make them more three-dimensional as the plot progresses until the resolution, while surprising, makes perfect sense.

All in all The Secret War is great fun and a terrific read, an interesting take on a familiar idea that falls somewhere between epic fantasy and boys-own adventure it’s a heady mix that’s well worth investigating. As for me, the sequel ‘The Hoard Of Mhorrer’ has already migrated to the ‘must read’ pile.

The Secret War is published by Tor through Pan MacMillan and is available from Play.com, Blackwell and all good book stores.

MFW Curran maintains the ubiquitous website and blog which you can find here.