As I started to read The Exhumation I was reminded of Ernest Hemingway’s For Whom the Bell Tolls which I read as a teenager many decades ago. It was therefore no surprise to me that on his Amazon page Nick Padron describes his book as a continuation of that great novel.

Like Hemingway, Padron explores the frustrations and brutality of the Spanish Civil War where the death toll included more executed civilians than fighters killed in action. In common with most civil wars, loyalties pitched relatives and former friends against one another; neutrality was nigh on impossible. As the war escalated the two sides were assisted militarily by like-minded countries; principally Germany and Italy on the Nationalist side, Russia and Mexico on the Republican side. Although many countries pledged non-intervention, many of their young people travelled to Spain to fight alongside their respective like-minded Spaniards. On the Republican side many were organised into the International Brigades.

Hemingway’s protagonist, Robert Jordan, was an American who lost his life fighting for an International Brigade and Padron’s plot involves an attempt to recover his body and return it to his wealthy US family. The three man recovery team consists of an elderly uncle who is supported by Major Williamson and our protagonist, “John”. We are given limited information about all three but it is clear that the Major and John have been involved in previous clandestine adventures. Although John is supposedly the interpreter we learn that he has other skills and that he can be brutal when required. We are also given some fascinating insights into his background but even so, at the end of the book I felt there was still much that I didn’t know about him.

The story is told in the first person from John’s perspective. The text and the story flow well, keeping the reader interested. John’s role as interpreter gives some lighter moments as he struggles with the regional variations in the Spanish language. Like Hemingway he uses formal English to reflect the differences.

The plot is principally an adventure with some intrigue, violence, a lot of tense movement through hostile areas and the romance between John and Maripaz who found love at such an inconvenient time.

I can see that Padron has previously published a number of books and short stories, alongside a musical career. Writing sequels to successful novels can sometimes be viewed as opportunistic in that to some extent the characters and settings have already been created but even so, I consider that The Exhumation is well worth a read.