The Shrapnel Academy

Fay Weldon

'The setting of this enjoyable novel is the Shrapnel Academy a country-house centre for the study of military excellence...Here one winter weekend a group of guests gather for the eve-of-Waterloo dinner and to hear Gen. Leo Makeshift deliver the annual Wellington lecture...Below stairs lurks a huge army of Third World servants with their illegal hangers-on led by a lunatic African butler. Murder is plotted. Snow falls. All are trapped...that rare treat: a wildly funny deeply serious novel' Daily Telegraph>