1805: the Napoleonic wars. “Lucky” Jack Aubrey, Captain of HMS Surprise, hunts a much larger French warship, Acheron, off the South American coast. After a brutal engagement leaves the British ship all but dead in the water, should Jack stagger back to England in shame or press on against all the odds?
This blend of at least three of Patrick O’Brien’s remarkable Aubrey-Maturin novels is a thrilling maritime adventure.
The action sequences are vivid and shocking, and Russell Crowe’s fiery captain is a perfect counterpoint to Paul Bettany’s subtly charismatic ship’s surgeon.