Browning Battles On

‘One of the bayonets came to rest just below my Adam’s apple. I looked down at the shiny steel and then slowly looked along the length of the rifle barrel up into the face of my executioner. He wore thick glasses with metal rims and he had gold fillings in his teeth. I could see the teeth because he was smiling.’

All Richard Browning expects is to go through the motions of making a propaganda film, wear an officer’s uniform, stay in a few fancy hotels and enjoy the fleshpots of war-time Sydney. Instead, he is forced to slog through the Queensland jungle, dodge bullets and bombs and endure the discomforts of a military prison.

As Browning ducks and weaves in and out of trouble, his companions in strife are ‘Harry’ Kaminaga, Hawaiian-born Japanese soldier, and Ushi Tanvier, Darlinghurst prostitute. His friendship with the hell-raising actor, Peter Finch, offers him some prospect of escape from his problems, but his enemies in Military Intelligence and among the blackmarket racketeers of the big smoke don’t see why he should survive World War II.

Coming home wasn’t meant to be like this…