Out of the surge and the roar of the sea, the sound of guns, and the heady intoxication of a fair wind ahead, comes a new saga of that Hercules of the seas, Horatio Hornblower. As admiral in charge of His Britannic Majesty's West Indies Station, he is as indomitable as ever. Gallant, daring, impulsive, whether pacing the deck of a be calmed ship or battling "Hornblower's Hurricane" at the mast, he is, as ever, a human being first and an admiral second.
In C. S. Forester's masterly narrative, Hornblower sails over seas as challenging as any in his long career. Into the tense aftermath of the Napoleonic Wars pour hordes of ambitious, conniving, and ruthless individuals: pirates, vagabonds, revolutionaries–even nations scheming to tear apart the remnants of the French Empire. By fair means or by foul, by intrepid daring or by wily strategy, Hornblower masters them all, on the strange currents of a foreign sea.
There is, for instance, the puzzling phenomenon of bearskin helmets in the tropics, in an episode where Hornblower combines the acumen of Sherlock Holmes with the excitement of a sea chase, and a terrible moment when the Admiral is hard-pressed to sacrifice his honor. There are the guns of Carabobo; the millionaire who dines on caviar and champagne and death; and the ripping, tearing, roaring finale of the hurricane.
The story is awash with a host of colorful, robust, and daring characters, some new, some happily familiar: the ingenious and elegant Spendlove, who is kidnaped by pirates and held as a hostage for Hornblower; a trumpeter named Hudnutt, with a mutinous case of "artistic conscience"; Hornblower's beautiful and aristocratic wife, Barbara; 'the innocent Sir Thomas Fell, unwitting recipient of more good luck than he knows; and many others diplomats, pirates, rude captains and courteous traitors, rough sailors, soldiers, and impeccable governors. The ship, the captain, and the crew of the mighty Hornblower legend are endearingly familiar, but the latest story is, as always, breath-takingly and irresistibly new.
—from the dust jacket
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