David Donachie (1944–2023)

Pressed into King George's Navy for the second time in a month, John Pearce and his Pelicans find themselves working aboard the HMS Brazen, sailing the Channel from Plymouth to Dover in search of the numerous French privateers that prey on English merchant shipping: her task to stop them and, if possible, to capture or destroy them. Pearce has greater things on his mind--he must rescue his ailing father from the dangers of revolutionary Paris and to do that he must somehow leave the ship. He tries mutiny, the crew being readied by failure, but Captain Benjamin Colbourne is quick and smartly promotes Pearce to Midshipman.… (meer)

Following Nelson's victory at the Nile he was feted at home. Further victories against the French raised his popularity with the public at large to fever pitch. But at court Nelson's ego and his love for Emma Hamilton, seen as little more than a whore by the courtiers surrounding George III, dogged his progress. Only in death was he finally accepted at the heart of society. Following both Nelson's exceptional career and the spirited progress of Emma, this is a story of talent and character overcoming tradition and expectation; a story of a society on the cusp of the liberal 18th and conservative 19th centuries and the fate of two people caught in the middle of the change. From Arctic ice flow to Neapolitan courtroom, from single ship actions in the dank English Channel to fleet actions in the mouth of the Nile, this is the story of a great hero, a doomed love affair and a war that stretched across the world.… (meer)