It doesn't hurt to be more knowledgeable about seafaring, because it will help to unpack some of the denser maneuvers and the like that are a big part of the battles and cutting-out expeditions, and suchlike. Luckily there are a number of companion volumes aimed at lubbers that will help. I picked up this one on my first run through, and it helped get a handle on things. It's still sometimes frustrating to have to look up a number of different terms all at once, but once you have a better sense of them the action flows a little smoother, imo.
But no, I wouldn't say the later books are overburdened with impenetrable naval terminology, or at least none that I remember as being particularly bad. There are some really terrific scenes that I remember vividly coming up for you, too.
Perhaps Two Years Before the Mast. It's just one book, but a very good one. The author tells of his experiences taking a leisurely journey from Boston to California. I can't speak to the quality of the narration, though the sample I just heard wasn't bad by any means.
Just searched Audible and the Patrick Tull version was the first result.
Tull is definitely my narrator of choice for this series, I'm just finishing my second go-round on the entire series with his narration.
If it does there is a small industry of books published to explain it all. Patrick O'Brian's Navy for example.
The Battle of Waterloo with Peter Snow by Dan Snow's History Hit https://player.fm/1wbURF #nowplaying. Just listening to this right now. Mostly deals with the lobsters,but other episodes cover the age of sail and the wooden world.
I don't know if you're aware, but there is a marvellous companion book to the series called "Lobscouse and Spotted Dog" containing recipes for every food mentioned in the series.
Amazon link here, obviously also available from other retailers.
Personally, I have made figgy dowdy (it's very similar to spotted dog) a number of sauces, Lobscouse and a sea pie following their instructions. Oh, and quite a lot of the cocktails.
It's a charming book, very much in the flavour of the novels, and I can't recommend it highly enough. As a bonus, there's an intricately worked out time line which will reveal just which Midshipman was responsible for the theft of Stephen's madder fed rats. (Yes, there is also a tested recipe for rat in onion sauce... Madder optional.)
Do you know about A Sea of Words by Dean King? It’s a lexicon/companion to the series and helps with the nautical terms. There’s a German edition: https://www.amazon.de/-/en/Dean-King-ebook/dp/B007DFUQ72
As it stands, I started with the library versions (Overdrive is amazing, isn't it?), and if the library version was checked out I got impatient and just got the Audible version. So, now I have a library that looks something like 1,2,5,8...it's very frustrating.
So I kept the mp3s from the library and installed smart audiobook player, and it works well enough.
I think Evan Thomas did a bio.
Yes, he did. Great writer
You might enjoy the story. This would have been during POB's tour of the US, the time he had dinner aboard the U.S.S. Constitution in Boston with William F. Buckley and Walter Cronkite, 1999 maybe. I think Patrick Tull was there too. I was active then on the POB Usenet group and one of the members invited the others to his home near Boston for a party in celebration. I don't know how he got Patrick Tull to come.
I showed up with a couple bottles of sparkling wine and some homemade cheese straws and found myself in a very nice kitchen meeting the "amiable sluts", the mother and daughter team who wrote Lobscouse and Spotted Dog. Amiable indeed! They praised my cheese straws, which went straight to my heart. And then, wafting over our heads, there was The Voice. I followed it to its source and found Patrick Tull standing in a group of admirers and poured out on him a brief flood of fanboy geekieness. I had already spent so many hours with his voice.
Later he favored the company with a performance of the Off Hats! piece. Very moving, as always. The party showed what you know already, that POB fans are some of the nicest people.
For an android text based / choose your own adventure type RPG: A Choice of Broadsides
It explicitly draws from POB and I'm far from the first week has made an Aubrey and an anti-Aubrey prototype.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.choiceofgames.broadsides
Thank you, but yeah for some reason It's not available on Kindle (in the UK at least).
It's something I'm really interested in but Kindle is a must.
The first few are collected together in an omnibus! You can find it here It's one of those series where the author jumps around a lot in the timeline, I've had to use wikipedia to keep track of things.
The first Bolitho “novel” is actually a collection of three shorter novellas, put together as The Complete Midshipman Bolitho: https://www.amazon.com/Complete-Midshipman-Bolitho-Alexander-Kent/dp/1590131274
Another cake idea is a Tortuga Rum Cake. Maybe the classic version, not the pineapple. You can make them or buy them online. Rummy and buttery and vanilla.
Here's a great album of sea shanties and songs to get hold of from the usual suspects https://www.amazon.com/Sea-Shanties-Robert-Shaw/dp/B00000JPC1
It has all the best ones on it.
Do it all, over and over again, you'll never get bored. Patrick Tull will put the voices in your head forever, and reading the books will permanently record the wonderful passages of prose, to the point where you will be able to picture them on the page.
It's up to you how far you want to jump in on the seamanship. You'll follow Stephen's comical travails at coming to grips with the stuff and pick your own level. If you jump right in, there are many companion books that show you the ropes, so to speak, as well as independent volumes about ships, rigging and terminology like the Sailor's Vade Mecum. O'Brian's erudition is, as many have said, staggering. I've even got one of those fun books of Stephen Biesty's Cross-Sections Book - Man-Of-War. You can actually read the whole thing without learning any seamanship, but it's likely you'll pick up something.
The film is good too, for conveying that sense of the 'wooden world', the creaking of the timbers and the howling of the winds, and the teeming crowds of sailors aboard.
Welcome aboard, sir or ma'am. A glass of wine with you.
May I humbly recommend some additional resources that shall enrich your delight?
- "A Sea of Words" will greatly facilitate your understanding of the languages, terms, and jargon of the period and the Navy. It's not necessary to comprehend the novels, but it will aid in your pleasure of them.
- "Harbors and High Seas" may be of service in helping you track the maritime voyages and movements of Jack and Stephen, the creatures.
Over the years I have tried to find something to catalogue my Audiobooks I haven't found anything suitable yet So for me I have devised this, that works for me. I find an Audiobook I have a Google search page addressed To Goodreads pinned to the bookmark bar in Firefox I look up the book, author or series name I then cut the Audiobook and paste it into the appropriate subdirectory on my Audiobook hard disk that is sorted into all the genre's needed Example Action Adventure Biography Classics Crime and so on Usually under the name of the author Then in subdirectories of the series Etc Then I have the brilliant free search tool Everything (https://www.voidtools.com/en-au/downloads/)
IT is a instant search tool for files on your computer if I need to find a particular Audiobook just type it into the search area and it finds it, then you can either click on it and open it or open the path to it I have been using this method for years and find it to be the best method for me to find anything that I need on my computer Hopefully this tip will make it easier for people to at least make some semblance of your ever growing Audiobook Collection Tony
I like using libro.fm to avoid audible/amazon.
Clarissa Oakes is also titled The Truelove and that might have led to some confusion.
Anyway, here's the libro link.
Great, thanks!
It's on Librivox and Project Gutenberg, so there's no excuse not to read this.
I have just started 'Nemesis' too, but mine's by Adrian G. Marshall, subtitled 'The first Iron Warship and Her World'.
https://www.amazon.com/Nemesis-Adrian-G-Marshall/dp/0750967374/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=Nemesis+adrian+marshall&qid=1624599266&sr=8-1
To quote the remarks on the rear cover: "This lively narrative places her (Nemesis) in the historical context of the last years of the East India Company . . It tells of her exploits in the first Opium War, in Pirate suppression and naval actions across Asia."
It is not a novel as such, but it reads as more than a simple historical retelling, or perhaps I haven't read enough of those to judge. There are considerable appendices describing the ship and the Royal Navy's strength at that time. There are numerous photographs and other illustrations.
So far it's very promising, very readable. There are a few familiar ship names, eg Calliope, Diana, but I'm not sure whether these are later generation ships than any mentioned by O'Brian.
Anyone know the relationship between that book and this one by the same author? They appear to have come out about the same time, and the one you linked mentions having maps so is it just the same as the one I linked with the addition of a lexicon?
May I suggest a prodigious fine book, Lobscouse and Spotted Dog, which I find answers handsomely when one is sharp-set after a long watch.
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So it's not officially a third in that series but it may as well be as it's performed by the same violinist and based on the series. It's on par with vol. 1 in my opinion and really helps me get into the sailing ship mood!
Musical Evenings in the Captain's Cabin https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0001HAHEQ/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_szexFbFPM4ZDK
Copyright considerations to note, I agree. You shouldn't just use that book as your material without approval.
There's another book I enjoy called "An Ocean of Words". Peter D. Jeans.
It's particular strength is listing words and phrases we still use that have maritime origins. It has some illustrations and more detail than the Dean King book but is not specifically paired to it.
https://www.amazon.com/Ocean-Words-Dictionary-Nautical-Phrases/dp/1559724501