- Hardcover
- Publisher: HarperCollins; First American Edition edition (1999)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0000225959
- ISBN-13: 978-0000225955
- ASIN: 0393048446
- Product Dimensions: 21.6 x 14.8 x 2.7 cm
- Shipping Weight: 476 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars See all reviews (46 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #648,922 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
|
||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||
Product Details |
Tag this product(What's this?)Think of a tag as a keyword or label you consider is strongly related to this product.
Tags will help all customers organize and find favorite items. |
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most helpful customer reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
The last of one of the greatest of all historical fiction series,
By gilly8 "gilly8" (Mars, the hotspot of the U.S.) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Blue at the Mizzen (Audio Cassette)
I am writing this several years now after "Blue at the Mizzen" was released. It seemed shortly thereafter I heard that the author Patrick O'Brian, then in his 90's, had died. I remember actually having tears at the thought that Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin would be on the sea forever, and never again on land and we readers of theirs would never know anything about them again. Since then the publisher released a short chapter-long handwritten book of what would have been Mr O'Brian's first few pages of his next book...but I haven't yet been able to read it yet. Also the movie with Russell Crowe came out, a combination of a few of the books put together and not too bad at all. If you love a book, I think you always fear when you hear a movie is going to be made!! Overall, as most of the other reviewers here have said, it is a wonderful series that I doubt will ever be duplicated. If anyone is reading any of these reviews and has not read the series, you MUST start with "Master and Commander" and go in order for it to make sense, this series builds upon each prior book. It is, as others have said, one very long book. In fact, it is 20 years or so of the lives of these two men whom we come to care so much about, and who come to feel so real to us. I must add, I have read Aubrey was based on a real person, I've been looking but can't locate the name right now. I know the details and research O'Brian put into the books are true to life. It was a terribly hard life, and not for the weak, whether you were a common sailor or an officer. Thank you Patrick O'Brian, for the pleasure in the reading, and for the great amount of information about this time in history,that you have saved and passed on to us and to future generations!
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
End of the Adventure,
By
This review is from: Blue at the Mizzen (Paperback)
The end of a great book always produces a letdown for me so it was a double whammy to realize as I turned the last page of Blue at the Mizzen that it was book-series-match. Reflecting back on the 20 Aubrey-Maturin books that I had read and the timeless quality of the characters, plots and historical background that brought these books to life only deepened my depression. And when I considered the tracks that O'Brian artfully laid down in this book to carry him into yet additional Aubrey-Maturin books--I decided that I needed a brandy. Patrick O'Brian is undoubtedly one of the few true masters of historical fiction and a polymath with incredible literary talent.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Historical fiction doesn't get much better than this series.,
By
This review is from: Blue at the Mizzen (Paperback)
I'm reviewing, here, the entirety of O'Brian's Aubrey/Maturin series, because I consider it to be essentially one novel.The first, and most astonishing, strength of this series is in its characterization. Not only are the contrasting, yet inseparable, friends Jack and Stephen believable, appealing, vividly human characters, but they change realistically through time. To the reader, they appear as "real" people with "real" lives, perhaps more so than some of the the flesh and blood ephemera around us. The secondary characters, too, shine -- Killick is priceless. Research, of course, is O'Brian's other great strength. It's not only the ships, about which he seems to know everything. There's no aspect of the period -- food, dialect, religion, music -- in which he does not seem to be well versed. And he conveys this information to the reader in interesting ways, rather than encumbering the text with massive info-dumps. One often overlooked bright spot in this series is its humor. Too often historical fiction has a self-consciously grim quality. O'Brian can be grim -- crushingly depressing, in fact --but... "Swiving Monachorum". Action and battles are not, strangely, this series' strongest point. When we get them, they're great, but too often they are skipped over or told in a distant third-person viewpoint. But the worst here is still very good indeed. I would recommend reading all of these, in order, starting with the first one, right away, as soon as you possibly can. It's true that The Hundred Days marks a low point -- I agree with the reviewers who cite O'Brian's loss of his wife as the reason -- but Blue at the Mizzen, under which I've posted this review, marks a triumphant return of the author's powers.
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
Want to see more reviews on this item?
|
Most recent customer reviews |
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Feedback
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
