Karya terbaik Ben Elton, yaitu novel Korban Pertama... dan ini bukan satir atau komedi gelap! . Bagaimana dengan investigasi polisi militer yang berlangsung di garis depan Ypres pada tahun 1917, selama Perang Dunia Pertama!!! Di atas skenario cerdik itu, Ben Elton tidak menahan diri dalam membahas kesia-siaan perang, ketidaksetaraan gender dan Suffragettes, perlakuan terhadap homoseksualitas, perbedaan kelas, Bolshevik Inggris, penentang wajib militer, pemberontakan Irlandia, sistem pemasyarakat...

Ben Elton memang orang yang cerdas.Itulah inti keseluruhan cerita Korban Pertama ini. Ben Elton memang orang yang cerdas, dan karakter utamanya adalah fantasi pemenuhan keinginan Ben Elton yang tersamarkan dengan begitu tipis.SAKSIKAN! Bagaimana Ben Elton menjelaskan di pengadilan mengapa ia terlalu cerdas untuk berperang di Perang Dunia I, menggunakan argumen-argumen yang baru dirangkai oleh para sejarawan pada tahun tiga puluhan.TERKESIMA! Bagaimana Ben Elton, meskipun terlalu cerdas untuk ber...

Jauh dari kata se-luar biasa dan memukau seperti *Blackadder Goes Fourth* karya Ben Elton, *Korban Pertama* tetap menjadi tambahan yang menarik dalam ranah fiksi kontemporer Perang Dunia I. Ini adalah sebuah ulasan buku yang patut dibaca bagi penggemar novel sejarah. Sebagian bergenre misteri pembunuhan, sebagian lagi semacam pemujaan terselubung terhadap Siegfried Sassoon (atau Wilfred Owen?), *Korban Pertama* menempatkan seorang penentang wajib militer, Inspektur Douglas Kingsley dari Scotlan...

Novel opens during a court case for crime of being a consciousness objector in WWI Interesting main character Douglas Kingsley, a Met Police inspector who argues with the judge about pointless killing during all wars. He even argues that fighting on behalf of Belgium was wrong as they were slaughtering native people in [Belgian] Congo - which caused rage in the judge & courtroomKingsley, Abecrombie, Hopkins et al are unusual & richly drawn war time characters - they are conscientious obj...

Another great read from Ben Elton - who knew?
Researches his topic and the period so well. Learn a lot about a lot. Not just a whodunnit.

Ben Elton is a brilliant story teller. This book is set in 1917 and concerns a conscientious objector policeman who is sent to Flanders to investigate a murder. Some of the battle scenes are very graphic but do show how life must have been in the trenches.

Reading this page turner made me realize just how much of the British current collective psyche has been influenced by the two Great Wars. The protagonist's moral awakening, to his one man revolutionary crusade failure; his abject realization of failure during incarceration; his rebirth after his rescue to his voluntary participation on the Flanders front completes the formation of British psyche in the Industrial age. Elton's assertion that 'Compromises a man has to make with misery and injusti...

Ex Bookworm group review:I have always liked Ben Elton. I think he is a funny and intelligent man. But I did not like this.The main problem for me was that Elton just couldn’t decide what the book should be. It certainly wasn’t a novel of suspense. After all, it took at least half the book to even get the policeman to the scene of the crime. It wasn’t really a “whodunnit” because the clues weren’t there for us to work out. (Mind you, I always thought Shannon had done it simply because he was so ...

My second Ben Elton and while it was better than the first book I read - Blind Faith - it isn't saying much as Blind Faith was a mere '2 Star' read for me. This was not a bad book, but I thought that it could have been done better, given the interesting premise.Douglas Kingsley is a stubborn idealist (not a pacifist, mind you) who works as a policeman in World War-I era Britain. And alike all egoistical idealists, he denies to participate in the war even though that means his family would also h...

The First Casualty of War is of course truth: with hindsight it is easy to label WW1 futile and lament the loss of A 'Golden Generation' At the time anyone who spoke out against the senseless carnage risked imprisonment, or social obvilion at the least. and so having defended himself in court, explaining why he refuses to climb into a uniform and shot some hapless German citizen whose government is also urging him to kill Brits & their allies by whipping up the same propaganda, our hero find...