3 out of 5

Ennis’ serious tales tend to take one of a few angles – they are event based, in the sense that he shapes a story around an occurrence, factual or semi-factual, and then characters are populated to heighten the resonance of the themes.  They are character based – these tending to be my favorite – where the narrative voice isn’t just telling the tale, rather, we’re on an emotional trip with them.  They are responding, they are evolving.  The story is theirs.  And then there are the historical stories, something that Garth stumbled across in his studies that he wants to do justice with a proper send-off.  Sometimes these are incredibly interesting – D-Day Dodgers is an interesting story – but they’re generally not as involving, by their nature, regardless of how many recognizable and relate-able personality types are stuffed in there.

The term was apparently a reference to Allied soldiers stationed in Italy, a disparaging term implying that they weren’t doing much of anything while others were fighting the war.  Ennis introduces us to some of these soldiers via a new officer to the tribe, who must learn the realities of politics and war before being sent into battle to see just how serious things are.  What works exceedingly well here is that Garth leads us into the history one step at a time.  There’s a nice and short text blurb to set the stage, and then the grizzled vet to the newbie chatter fills us in at a good pace, making the inevitable conclusion and inclusion of the D-Day Dodgers song (known at the time, sung sarcastically) have some weight – sometimes Garth will include a dash of song or poem from the time mid-story and it’s always a wonder to me if it’s supposed to resonate, like we’re supposed to already be familiar with 40s German folk songs or something.  The second thing that works – John Higgins’ pencils.  I could be culling this incorrectly from memory, but Higgins worked on Pride & Joy for Ennis, and his pencils cheesed it up.  It was already a pretty cheesy father / son tale, but Higgins slapped on the emotional paint and it just added another layer of soap opera onto the whole thing.  Maybe he was born to work on this more stoic stuff – not too manly, not too emotive – because his character models on this book are full of life and individuality.  From extras that we meet on the road to our principles, there’s never a doubt who’s who, and not just based on facial features, but the way they ‘carry’ themselves.

It’s a very fascinating historical note, done with perfect patience and respect.  It’s not very moving, per se, beyond the learning experience, but I’d still read a dry, factual Ennis war book over some over-dramatic hero pap any day.