"The Making of a Legionnaire" by Bill Parris
Posted: Tue 27 Jul, 2004 3:10 pm
A Geordie joins the Legion! It's an account of his five years in the French Foreign Legion, detailing joining and training and his time in 2 REP (a parachute regiment within the Legion, considered very chuffin' tough). There's some jungle shenanigans and a couple of conflicts thrown in as well.
All in all it does give a good idea of what it's like in the Legion. Parris fancies himself as something of an artiste, but it's worth ignoring the tongue-chewing horrors of his prose for the story it's trying to mangle. It leaves you with the impression that he just hastily slapped together a 'training book' to cash in on the very healthy market but it was still well worth reading if you're interested in such things. The hardback RRPs at £16.99 though, so you might want to sniff about the library.
:grab:
All in all it does give a good idea of what it's like in the Legion. Parris fancies himself as something of an artiste, but it's worth ignoring the tongue-chewing horrors of his prose for the story it's trying to mangle. It leaves you with the impression that he just hastily slapped together a 'training book' to cash in on the very healthy market but it was still well worth reading if you're interested in such things. The hardback RRPs at £16.99 though, so you might want to sniff about the library.
:grab: