FULL REVIEW

With its captivating, pungent, and sharply drawn characters, this first instalment in a series of sea stories is a welcome addition to the Napoleonic sea story genre. Jean Cotterell, captain of a Jersey fishing vessel, loses his ship and crew to a violent gale off the coast of Nova Scotia. He alone survives, to be plucked from the sea by a French warship. He recognizes the captain of the Hrotnese as the brutal privateer who murdered his father, an event he witnessed many years ago. Concealing his hatred, his desire for vengeance, and his identity, Jean discovers that the French crew is decimated by illness and left ill-prepared for imminent attack by an English warship.

Battered by cannon and sinking with bilge, the Hortense limps across the ocean, her cruel captain desperately wounded, Cotterell must use all his seafaring skills in an attempt to save the ship, his enemies, and the few friends he's made on board. At the conclusion of his adventure, he finds himself imprisoned, forced to pay for his freedom with a challenging form of servitude.

The situations depicted are desperate yet lightened by a dry humour and witty exchanges, Bowling takes his reader to the heart of the action, be it a storm, a sea battle, or a shipboard amputation, sparing no detail. The narrative and dialogue are both prosaic and poetic. A rousing, impressive start to the series.

Margaret Barr

Historical Novels Review

FULL REVIEW

I enjoyed the book tremendously. The challenge of writing a book from the French perspective must have been very daunting for Mr. Bowling, though I must say he pulled it off quite well. I enjoyed the fresh perspective. A work of historical naval/nautical fiction is difficult enough for a new author, with a host of details, both historical and nautical to carry off correctly and a story line to plot and characters to build and follow.

Having been a reader of the English point of view, and a few American perspectives, it is obvious that the French side presents quite a mix of revolutionary ideals, fear, brutality and all of the confusion of those early years of the terror. I believe Tom has captured that mix well his crew aboard the Hortense, and has displayed a keen understanding of the confusion and chaos that would be present under those conditions. I watched for details on the French vessel that are so different than an English one, apart for the names of things, and can find no glaring errors that I can recall. One thing that I did notice, he speaks of braziers being used to heat shot aboard prior to battle. I don't believe that this was a practice of the French at sea. Unlike the British, they did have bread ovens aboard and produced fresh bread at sea, but braziers alight in battle would be too great a risk to themselves. All ovens braziers and stoves would have been doused prior to battle.

The book reads at a good pace, I enjoyed his depth of detail on the life aboard and the radical mix of characters, as well as the presence of female crew members and passengers. His historical image of the cod fishery is spot on and the practices as well. His descriptions of life aboard reeks of character, though I though I might see a reference to the French's use of garlic somewhere. He has captured the chaos of the French naval system well, Lord knows how they operated effectively is a wonder, but then they really didn't did they? It makes you wonder how they did as well as they did. Seamanship on the seaman's level is well covered, their fishery produced some great sailors , as did their system of privateers and merchant service. Tom did an excellent job of working in the disastrous results that the terror had on the French naval service officer class.

The action sequences were stirring and well executed. I would question one detail though. Bullets, grapeshot, canister, bar, chain shot or canon balls, would not be laying around the deck of the target vessel. They would be imbedded in all kind of places, creating plenty of splinters, yes, but few if any would be laying around , spent. The ballistics of such objects are just too great, their energy is tremendous, and taking off a man's head, would not even deplete a fraction of it's energy. Musket fire would imbed in deck planking or bulwarks, canister or grape, would inflict terrible carnage, and then imbed into every wood surface, or carry on into the sea on the other side. Canon balls as well, would often pass through the vessel or more often, become imbedded in the wooden bulwarks or wreak havoc as they did so.

Toms imagery of the sea is well done, as is his storm and grounding sequences. The details of the wind, tide and conditions are well considered and the seamanship considerations are well thought out and accurate.

I enjoyed this book and would recommend it to my friends. I am certainly going to be watching for future books from this author, as I believe he has a great future, and will become one of the leading authors in the historical naval fiction genre. The style of his writing is exciting, his approach novel and his attention to detail super. He displays all of the elements that a reader looks for in this genre.

Robert Squarebriggs