Mauritius Command

In ‘The Mauritius Command’ Captain Jack Aubrey is ashore on half-pay without a command until his friend, and occasional intelligence agent, Stephen Maturin, arrives with a secret order for Aubrey to take a frigate to the Cape of Good Hope, under a Commodore’s pennant. But the difficulties of carrying out his orders are compounded by two of his own captains – one a pleasure-seeking dilettante, the other liable to provoke the crew to mutiny.

Based on the actual campaign of 1810 in the Indian Ocean, O’Brian’s attention to the detail of eighteenth-century life ashore and at sea is meticulous. This tale is as beautifully written and as gripping as any in the series; it also stands on its own as a superlative work of fiction.