adam_mcphee 's review for:

The Wars by Timothy Findley

5.0

---

My favourite world war one novel. It's sort of Homeric in a way, in that the author uses his metaphors to connect the the world of war to the world of peace. Also, the old story about Canadians coming up with the idea of urinating on rags and then covering their faces with them as a deterrent to chlorine gas attacks gets retold here, though in a much nastier version: as the gas sinks down into their crater, Robert Ross is initially unable to convince his troops that it will work, and they're almost at the point of mutiny because there's only one gas mask.