Master and Commander

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In this, the first of Patrick O’Brian’s much lauded Aubrey-Maturin novels, discover a vibrant world conjured by a master storyteller, rich with detail and character.

1800. Napoleon Bonaparte is the biggest threat to peace yet seen. Newly promoted to command of his first ship, Captain Jack Aubrey, along with his crew, and new friend and ship’s surgeon Stephen Maturin, must patrol a Mediterranean fraught with peril but rich with rewards. A glimpse of white sails on the horizon could mean a prize to be taken – or a fight for survival. In Aubrey and Maturin, Patrick O’Brian has created two of the most enjoyable characters in twentieth-century fiction.

As recommended in the Slightly Foxed podcast, Episode 7.

‘If O’Brian’s novels have become a cult, this is because they are truly addictive . . . They are, quite magnificently, adventure yarns whose superb authenticity never distracts from the sheer thrill of the action.’ Sunday Telegraph

O’Brian, Patrick

O’Brian’s World

Grant McIntyre on Patrick O’Brian’s Aubrey/Maturin novels

O’Brian’s mastery of language is most wonderful of all. He manages to capture that mixture of toughness and grace which, for me at least, makes formal eighteenth-century English so attractive....