“Read as a straightforward adventure yarn, ‘Banana Republican’ offers the pleasures of an exotic setting, inventive plotting and a metaphor that captures the waste and fatuity of our more recent global misadventures — not too bad for a slender and unpretentiously written little novel.” —Richard Schickel, Los Angeles Times
"This first fictional work from Rauchway is a comic picaresque novel of the type made popular by George Fraser in his Flashman novels. But in place of mid-19th-century Europe, we have 1924 Nicaragua, and instead of Harry Flashman, we have English poseur Tom Buchanan, formerly of Yale varsity football and 100 percent bluster. If the name sounds familiar, it's because Buchanan was a character in The Great Gatsby, where he got a bad rap as a bully, a boor, and a braggart. He's all of these, but as Tom would say, 'What's wrong with that?' In this delightful novel, Buchanan is sent by his aunt, who controls the purse strings, to set things right for family interests in Nicaragua, where after the first 'free' election in Nicaraguan history, all sides are battling to see who will loot the country's coffers first. Tom looks like a hero but avoids risk of any sort, while he pleasures women and lives through harrowing adventures. After a long ride, he survives—undamaged, unrepentant, and a yahoo still... An enjoyable novel that begs for a sequel." —David Keymer, Library Journal
