Rating: 
Summary: The Classic Foreign Legion Novel
Review: After all these years this book is still a classic of its kind. A bit slow in the beginning, Wren's writting rewards persistence as the characters begin to grow on the reader. The novel really starts to pick up somewhere after page 100 when John leaves the whodonnit atmosphere of Brandan Abbas and johns the Legion after his brothers. The reader will find a how-to manual here in how to join the Legion and what to expect with training. No doubt this is auto-biographical in nature from Wren's own expereinces with the Legion. He paints a somewhat mixed picture of the kinds of people one must serve with and it seems that one is devoted more to the Ideal of the Legion as opposed to its rather harsh reality. Those who have seen 1939 movie will find most of the books plot is sustained. There are a few minor differences. In the book the evil sarjeant is named Lajeaune as opposed to Markov in the movie. I suppose the latter name sounds more evil! There are a couple of other subtle changes like this. Also, at the end of the book the movie does not show the extent that John and Digby wandered for years in the desert with their two American friends in Arab mufti. In the battle scenes at the fort the book has the Arabs charging on foot as opposed to charging the walls on horseback as is shown in the movie. The book describes the fort's walls as lower which would explain some rationale for this, but the movie just makes it look rather foolish. The book gets better as you go along, so keep at it and you will be rewarded.
Rating: 
Summary: A Thrilling Yarn
Review: Beau Geste must rank very high with other all time great adventure novels. It has everything! Roamance, adventure,French foreign legionares, sadistic Sargeants, cut throat mutineers, arabs, escape on camels in Sahara, incedible frienships, brotherly love, sacrifices, and above all the Blue Water, the actual leitmotif. Blue water,a very rare saphire, belonged to Aunt Patricia,and is stolen from her mansion and the obvious culprit is one of the eight prersent when the lights went out and the jewel disappears. Among eight are the Geste brothers, Mike (Beau), Digby and the narrator, John. It is fascinating how Wren puts the jigsaw puzzle together, when two seperate versions of the same tale merge in the end. All good guys are
English/Americans, bad guys Italians, French or Germans. It is made for hollywood, hence so many versions. I could not put it down. Great read. Aunt Patricia pulls it off!
Rating:
Summary: the best book in the world
Review: do you ever feel like reading the best book in the world? well, here's your chance...
Rating: 
Summary: Not as good as its reputation
Review: I don't share most reviewers' enthusiasm for Percival Wren's book. The framework story unfolds at a painfully slow pace and the adventurous part of recruitment, training and life of the Geste brothers in the Foreign Legion is not broad enough. Too bad, because the French Foreign Legion, shrouded in the myth of secrecy and adventure, fascinates many to this day (including myself) and deserves to be object of a more suspenseful novel. The Foreign Legion garrison heroically defending Fort Zinderneuf against the Arabic attacks is undoubtedly the most memorable image of Wren's story. It is at the heart of the adventure for which the book is famous and Wren deserves the credit for the idea. But he spends too much time on minor characters and inconsequential dialogue. The characters are awfully stereotypical (the cunning and deceitful Italians, the brutal and primitive Germans, the noble and chivalrous English, the lighthearted and naïve Americans and the greedy and egotistical French - oh brother). Maybe many book reviewers are influenced by the great movie from 1939 (with Gary Cooper and Ray Milland). It is pretty true to the novel but focuses on the part of the story I was looking for and is well paced. In Wren's book, you have to read through more than 100 pages of turgid story telling before the Geste brothers even get to the Foreign Legion. Its longwinded explanations and speculations on the characters' motivation and the possible outcome of the inherent intrigues seem terribly old fashioned for the 21st century reader. This shortcoming of Wren's story telling ability diminishes the enjoyment of the book. Wren is no Alexandre Dumas who can write a novel of 1400 pages ("The Count of Monte Cristo") and still make it easy reading.
Rating:
Summary: Not as good as its reputation
Review: I don't share most reviewers' enthusiasm for Percival Wren's book. The framework story unfolds at a painfully slow pace and the adventurous part of recruitment, training and life of the Geste brothers in the Foreign Legion is not broad enough. Too bad, because the French Foreign Legion, shrouded in the myth of secrecy and adventure, fascinates many to this day (including myself) and deserves to be object of a more suspenseful novel. The Foreign Legion garrison heroically defending Fort Zinderneuf against the Arabic attacks is undoubtedly the most memorable image of Wren's story. It is at the heart of the adventure for which the book is famous and Wren deserves the credit for the idea. But he spends too much time on minor characters and inconsequential dialogue. The characters are awfully stereotypical (the cunning and deceitful Italians, the brutal and primitive Germans, the noble and chivalrous English, the lighthearted and naïve Americans and the greedy and egotistical French - oh brother). Maybe many book reviewers are influenced by the great movie from 1939 (with Gary Cooper and Ray Milland). It is pretty true to the novel but focuses on the part of the story I was looking for and is well paced. In Wren's book, you have to read through more than 100 pages of turgid story telling before the Geste brothers even get to the Foreign Legion. Its longwinded explanations and speculations on the characters' motivation and the possible outcome of the inherent intrigues seem terribly old fashioned for the 21st century reader. This shortcoming of Wren's story telling ability diminishes the enjoyment of the book. Wren is no Alexandre Dumas who can write a novel of 1400 pages ("The Count of Monte Cristo") and still make it easy reading.
Rating:
Summary: A Great Foreign Legion Action Adventure Novel!
Review: I enjoyed every minute of this book! I started to get into Foreign Legion stuff a couple of months back and I wondered if there was a story about the Legion or something like it. I found Beau Geste and completely loved it all the way thru. Most books put me to sleep, but Beau Geste I could not put down.
Rating:
Summary: one of the ulitimates in adventure stories
Review: I first saw the 1966 (starring Telly Savalas as the evil Sergeant Major) remake of Beau Geste in my early teens. It was not the best version of the story, with only 2 brothers in the story, and no mention of the stolen jewel, but it was action packed and the uniforms were awesome to a young teenage boy. Since then I have seen the 1939 (far superior) movie version, read the boooks and then read anything else I could get my hands on about the Legion in the early 20th century. This book is the epitome of grand adventure stories, rivalled only by two others: The Prisoner of Zenda and Kind Solomon's Mines. It's a book that appeals to your imagination and sense of adventure when you are young, and then you never outgrow it. I won't rehash the story here, but I suggest you get a copy, turn off all your modern, grown-up cycnicism and enjoy escapist literature at its very best.
Rating:
Summary: Action adventure at its best
Review: I had seen many of the movies as a kid, so I thought I should get the rest of the story by reading the book. Well, I was delightfully surprised by the book. The book was much more mysterious and intriguing then the movies. I liked the way the plot developed but the brothers seemed to age a lot more or maybe just matured more as the book went on. When you first meet them in Beau Geste and his band everyone comes across as if they were teenagers but within a couple of days after the disapearance of the blue water when the brothers join the legend you find out that they are all in their early 20s. The time in the legend seems longer too like almost 4 years but at the end of the story it's about half as long as that. The one thing about the version of the book I was reading which was the one with the pictures from the 1926 film was that there were no maps. So what I did was as I followed the brothers I would go on mapquest and print a map of the area and trace their route. Then I would fold it and keep it at that point in the book. I like the fact that they kept many of the terms in the native tongue. I have word and there are these downloads free from Microsoft that you can download so that you can translate in to many different languages. Between making the maps and figuring out the translations it made the book much more adventurous for me. I did not know much about the history of Algeria and I did not realize that the French had fought with the Arabs in Northern Africa for many generations. The Arabs are pretty stereotyped but there is the fact that the brothers learn Arabic to keep their minds sharp and this helps them down the road. I did not realize that Arabic languages were spoken all along North Africa and that it is mostly dessert. I thought that was more of the Middle East. You will notice that all the bad guys seem to be of the same nationality either being French like Legume or Italian like Bondini as opposed to the good guys being the English and the Americans. I like the fact that the American's were Texas Rangers because I think that is how the rest of the world perceives us. Buddy and Duke might have been caricatures but they were always honest and true just like the English characters of John, Digby and Michael were proper and honorable. The best part of the book was after the Fort at Zindernuf because you really don't see that part in the movies and you see how John, Digby, Buddy and Duke try to help each other to get to the English city of Kano in Nigeria. I really wanted to know what happened to one of the Americans but I won't give that away. At the end of the book I thought that I had everything figured out and I would know what Michael's letter was going to say but I was pretty surprise and it made me enjoy the overall theme of the novel. I would recommend this book to anyone who likes adventure novels about far away places.
Rating:
Summary: Action adventure at its best
Review: I had seen many of the movies as a kid, so I thought I should get the rest of the story by reading the book. Well, I was delightfully surprised by the book. The book was much more mysterious and intriguing then the movies.
I liked the way the plot developed but the brothers seemed to age a lot more or maybe just matured more as the book went on. When you first meet them in Beau Geste and his band everyone comes across as if they were teenagers but within a couple of days after the disappearance of the blue water when the brothers join the legend you find out that they are all in their early 20s. The time in the legend seems longer too like almost 4 years but at the end of the story it's about half as long as that.
The one thing about the version of the book I was reading which was the one with the pictures from the 1926 film was that there were no maps. So what I did was as I followed the brothers I would go on mapquest and print a map of the area and trace their route. Then I would fold it and keep it at that point in the book. I like the fact that they kept many of the terms in the native tongue. I have word and there are these downloads free from Microsoft that you can download so that you can translate in to many different languages. Between making the maps and figuring out the translations it made the book much more adventurous for me.
I did not know much about the history of Algeria and I did not realize that the French had fought with the Arabs in Northern Africa for many generations. The Arabs are pretty stereotyped but there is the fact that the brothers learn Arabic to keep their minds sharp and this helps them down the road. I did not realize that Arabic languages were spoken all along North Africa and that it is mostly dessert. I thought that was more of the Middle East.
You will notice that all the bad guys seem to be of the same nationality either being French like Legume or Italian like Bondini as opposed to the good guys being the English and the Americans. I like the fact that the American's were Texas Rangers because I think that is how the rest of the world perceives us. Buddy and Hank might have been caricatures but they were always honest and true just like the English characters of John, Digby and Michael were proper and honorable.
The best part of the book was after the Fort at Zindernuf because you really don't see that part in the movies and you see how John, Digby, Buddy and Hank try to help each other to get to the English city of Kano in Nigeria. I really wanted to know what happened to one of the Americans but I won't give that away.
At the end of the book I thought that I had everything figured out and I would know what Michael's letter was going to say but I was pretty surprise and it made me enjoy the overall theme of the novel.
I would recommend this book to anyone who likes adventure novels about far away places.
Rating:
Summary: worth reading twice
Review: I read this book as a freshman in high school and I was absolutely floored by it. My brother and I talked about it incessantly, and I went on to read its sequels, Beau Sabreur, and Beau Ideal. I very seldom read any book twice, but on July 1, 1961, I read Beau Geste again--I was then 6 years out of law school--and I enjoyed it just as much as I enjoyed it the first time.
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