Whether close to home or far away, there are no safe harbours while Napoleon seeks to dominate the known world.

Jack Aubrey, veteran of numerous battles, has been promoted to senior captain commanding a ship that has been sent out to reinforce the squadron blockading Toulon. Compared to the early days of the Napoleonic conflict, the action is slow, cold and dull. But a sudden turn of events takes Aubrey, and ship’s surgeon and spy Stephen Maturin, off on a hazardous mission to the Greek Islands, where the skill, daring and, indeed, luck of both men will be tested to the utmost.

With so much at risk, will a Turkish alliance carry the day?

‘I envy those who have never read Patrick O’Brian: an enormous pleasure awaits you.’

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JOHN LANCHESTER