Now hang on just a blinkin’ minute. I was told — quite firmly, I might add — that I couldn’t appear in the Funny Capers DownUnder books because “characters can’t cross series.” Some nonsense about creative boundaries, tonal balance and all that writerly twaddle. Fine, I said. If that’s how it is, I’ll stay in my own lane. But what do I find when I pick up Escape from Mad Bill’s Island? Major B.S. himself — the pompous old windbag from Major B.S. Comes to the End of His Rope— strutting about under the ridiculous alias of “Captain Billycock-Smythe.”
Don’t try to tell me it’s a coincidence. He’s the same bloke! The same haughty tone, the same overinflated self-importance, the same talent for turning every conversation into a lecture about “the Empire.” The only thing new is his obsession with what the British were up to on Mad Bill’s island during World War II — and I’ll admit, the answer he finds isn’t one he’s likely to brag about at the officers’ club. Serves him right, if you ask me.
Now, I don’t want to sound bitter (though I am), but how is it fair that I’m sidelined while that unpleasant specimen gets shipped in from another book like some kind of literary stowaway? The author told me “continuity matters,” then turns around and plonks Major B.S. on an island full of kelp, coconuts, and secrets. I’m tempted to lodge a formal complaint with the Fictional Characters’ Union.
Anyway — grievances aside — the book itself is a cracker. Escape from Mad Bill’s Island picks up the threads from Daddy’s Great Escape and tangles them into an even knottier mess. There’s mystery, menace and a faint whiff of something decomposing under the ferns. Mad Bill’s as menacing as ever, his island as inhospitable, and the newcomers — including our rebranded Major — discover there’s a very good reason nobody was supposed to dig too deeply into the island’s wartime past.
I’ll say this: the humour’s still delightfully dark, the pace brisk and the ending — well, it made me raise what’s left of my eyebrows. But I can’t promise to forgive the author. If characters can cross over now, I expect a proper invitation next time. And my own hut on the island. Preferably with indoor plumbing.
You can find Escape from Mad Bill’s Island as an ebook on Amazon, Kobo, Apple Books, or Barnes & Noble. If you prefer the smell of paper and ink, the paperbacks are on Amazon too.
JOHN MARTIN 