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900 ratings, 4.40 average rating, 51 reviews
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published
August 2002
(first published 2000)
binding
Audio Cassette
characters
setting
Unknown
isbn
184283374X
(isbn13: 9781842833742)
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other reviews (showing 1-20 of 1082)
This, the third of Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey-Maturin series, gave me great pleasure in reading. This came surely in part by again meeting the old, well-loved figures of the previous two books. It's true too that this is my third reading of the series as a whole, so a kind of nostalgia was partly in play. However that was certainly not all there was to it.
This book includes some extremely harrowing as well as uplifting sections, as well as O'Brian's usual streak of humor. We have m...more
This book includes some extremely harrowing as well as uplifting sections, as well as O'Brian's usual streak of humor. We have m...more
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Read in December, 2008
Picked this up at Vinnies (like most of my books) thought I should give it a try as I used to enjyou Jame's Clavell's stuff...this one isn't grabbing me right off, but we shall see...
"Surprise!"
I actually wound up kinda liking this one. No real strong feelings, but the character of the doc really kept the story engaging, and the naval battles were fun, even if I still haven't availed myself to really learn anything about the rigging of a ship.
I think...more
"Surprise!"
I actually wound up kinda liking this one. No real strong feelings, but the character of the doc really kept the story engaging, and the naval battles were fun, even if I still haven't availed myself to really learn anything about the rigging of a ship.
I think...more
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2 comments
Read in July, 2008
This series is wonderful for the way it captures life during the Napoleanic Wars. Much of it is about naval service, but it also addresses life on land quite clearly, both in England and, in this story, colonial India. To hear Mrs. Williams, Sophie's mother, talk about her daughter's fiancee Jack Aubrey is to hear a nastier, even more mercenary, Mrs. Bennett at work. The two main characters, Aubrey, the post-captain, brilliant at sea, if not on land, and Stephen Maturin, the ship's doctor, bu...more
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Read in September, 2007
recommends it for:
menomena
3rd in the Aubrey/Maturin series.
Standard fare for Obrian: solid, well-researched, historical fiction set in the time of the Napoleonic wars that is fun to read. I did not grow up anywhere near the ocean and I certainly don't live in a time when there are wind powered vessels in any great number so the technology is novel and fascinating to me. Even "action scenes" in these fictions occur over days as opposed to the frenzied cut-scene pace that the modern world is used to. Long,...more
Standard fare for Obrian: solid, well-researched, historical fiction set in the time of the Napoleonic wars that is fun to read. I did not grow up anywhere near the ocean and I certainly don't live in a time when there are wind powered vessels in any great number so the technology is novel and fascinating to me. Even "action scenes" in these fictions occur over days as opposed to the frenzied cut-scene pace that the modern world is used to. Long,...more
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Read in January, 2009
This book was great and jam-packed with action from start to finish. There were definitely moments in the book that were very intense and I didn't want to put the book down. I think that this is by far the best in the series up to this point - I really struggled some with the first two books. The characters really had personality and came to life in this book - you really began to see what they are made of. It is just a completely different time period and way of life it is very interesting ...more
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Read in December, 2004
recommended to Felicity by:
Ryan Grove
I never know what to say about Patrick O'Brian books in reviews. It's another Patrick O'Brian book; it made me laugh, made my pulse mount, made me stay up past my bedtime and lose great chunks of my day. Oh, and this one made me cry as well.
This one is particularly notable for the titular frigate, with whom I dare say any susceptible reader, not just Jack Aubrey, will fall deeply in love. The usual heady mixture of Aubrey's action and worries with Maturin's explorations and cogitati...more
This one is particularly notable for the titular frigate, with whom I dare say any susceptible reader, not just Jack Aubrey, will fall deeply in love. The usual heady mixture of Aubrey's action and worries with Maturin's explorations and cogitati...more
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Has Patrick O'Brian written a better novel than H.M.S. Surprise? All his strengths are here in force: his keen, winding prose, his breathless recreation of naval actions, his wonderful fleshing out of Jack and Stephen as two halves of the complete man. The action similarly leaps from peak to peak: Stephen's identity as a spy is betrayed, Jack takes command of the beloved ship of his youth, a fleet of British merchantmen braces itself against the French armada, and Stephen duels over the honor...more
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Read in March, 2008
This is the 3rd book in the Aubrey-Maturin series of seafaring tales in the British Navy during the Napoleonic era. In this episode, Jack Aubrey takes command of the Surprise, a ship where he was a midshipman in his younger years. I enjoyed this installment the most of any so far, I think. The characters just get more rich and delightful and real. It has scurvy, albatrosses, the Cape of Good Hope, India, dueling, spying, a drunk sloth, love lost, love gained, and really one of the most excit...more
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I love O'Brian! Lots of detail about ships and sailing, eating rats, lying around naked. Excellent writing and great adventures!
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Read in February, 1999
This is the third in the series. I enjoyed it. I am not one of the many that have read the entire series.
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It's good, entertaining, but just more of the same from the other books.
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Read in April, 2008
recommended to Angela by:
Anne and Alice liked themrecommends it for: action-novel fans, literature fans, maritime enthusiasts
I couldn't put this book down. It ate my week.
That said, the storytelling has deteriorated a bit from the first two Aubrey / Maturin novels. Stephen Maturin gets bashed about in the beginning, which is used somewhat heavy-handed, but when the frigate finally gets out to sea, the usual maritime brilliance of this series comes through. Great stuff! So cheerful and exciting, yet serious when it's merited. Made me laugh out loud several times. Oh, and I couldn't put it down.
That said, the storytelling has deteriorated a bit from the first two Aubrey / Maturin novels. Stephen Maturin gets bashed about in the beginning, which is used somewhat heavy-handed, but when the frigate finally gets out to sea, the usual maritime brilliance of this series comes through. Great stuff! So cheerful and exciting, yet serious when it's merited. Made me laugh out loud several times. Oh, and I couldn't put it down.
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Read in December, 2007
perhaps more then any other writer of historical fiction, O'Brian manages to create not only the physical aspects of his chosen period, but also illuminates how people of the time thought. To read the Aubrey novels is to immerse oneself into the 19th Century and its inhabitants with all their thoughts and predudices. Of course it shoudn't be forgotten that O'Brian is also an excellent storyteller with a gift for exciting battle narratives
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Another exciting volume in the Aubrey/Maturin series. Although the action only really picks up when Aubrey and co. arrive in India. India is evoked beautifully and, don't worry, there are plenty of sea battles to boot. I still find O'Brian's ability to produce memorable images astounding. Namely, in H.M.S. Surprise, Stephen's surprise meeting with Diana. Can't wait to get to the next in the series.
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4 comments
I'm not going to add all twenty O'Brians here, because I don't really have individual reviews for them. . . . All twenty just stand in my mind as one long reading experience of near-unalloyed pleasure. But H.M.S. SURPRISE was an especial favorite among those twenty, featuring Jack's first journey on the Surprise, Stephen's first (?) major betrayal by Diana, a duel, and of course the debauched sloth.
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Read in January, 2005
This might very well be my favourite of the whole series, introducing as it does the frigate Surprise, who would become as important a character in her own way as Jack or Stephen. O'Brian really succeeds in keeping the tension of the book between the angst and drama of Stephen's torture and the humour of Jack debauching Stephen's sloth. (Thinking of the latter never fails to make me giggle.)
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Has a copy to sell/swap
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Read in September, 2007
recommends it for:
sailors armchair or other
Probably the most complete of the Aubrey/Maturin novels. Like the entire series this deals with the exploits of a thinly disguised Lord Cochran in the Royal Navy of the Napoleonic wars. Appealing & reasonably human heroes, a great chase, wonderful description of a storm in the southern ocean, a bit of intrigue, some derring-do, some nice seabirds -what's not to like?
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Read in August, 2008
Third in the series and still loving it. There aren't very many battle scenes in this one. Those that happen are plenty warm though with the usual Jack Aubrey capers. They spend a good deal of the novel transporting an envoy from England to India. I felt the solitude (and a certain amount of tedium) of such a long voyage was adequately portrayed.
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