PAPERBACKS

DUNKIRK

by Hugh Sebag-Montefiore

(Penguin, £8.99)

ON SEPTEMBER 3, 1939, the British Expeditionary Force crossed the Channel. For the next eight months, not much happened. This was the socalled “phoney war”. “Any soldier who is in need of horizontal refreshment would be well advised to ask a policemann for a suitable address,” said Major-General Montgomery, who believed some brothels were less likely to give his men VD. Then the Germans attacked. This edition contains new first-hand accounts of the Allied attempts to hold the line while troops were evacuated from Dunkirk. It’s an awesome story of bodies that break under fire, and minds that remain calm.

WAKE UP, SIR!

by Jonathan Ames

(Pushkin Press, £8.99)

A MAN called Alan tells us that he’s writing a novel, that he went to Princeton, that he has a manservant called Jeeves. He’s obsessed with Britishness. Soon, some facts emerge. He’s a raging alcoholic. He’s living with his aunt and uncle in New Jersey on the condition that he does not drink. But he does. So he must leave. And now we join him in his drunken fantasy world on an adventure. Of course, this is a modern and rather dark take on P G Wodehouse: it’s weird, it’s clever, it’s funny. As Alan’s rickety mental state heads downhill the reader’s pleasure goes in the other direction.