The Mauritius Command

The Complete Aubrey/Maturin Novels Volume 1: The Mauritius Command by Patrick O’Brian (2016 Harper Collins hardcover 324pp)

 

 

 

First an apology – It’s been close to a month since I finished reading this book and plenty of other things have happened in the meantime. So as a result, I don’t have a crystal-clear memory of the story synopsis and this review will be brief and to the point.

The fourth Aubrey-Maturin novel begins with ‘Lucky Jack’ Aubrey once again land-bound. He’s living the domestic life with his new bride, their new twin babies and his Mother-in-law in a small run-down cottage in the English countryside. He longs for life on the high-seas and after a visit from Stephen Maturin he gets his wishes. He is given a temporary promotion to the rank of Commodore and takes command of a small fleet of ships tasked with taking control the French Indian Ocean island possesions.

In this volume gone are the long passages detailing the arduous sailing journeys to far-flung destinations. Instead, we seem to dart between locations from paragraph to paragraph. I found this change disconcerting and feel it lost something as a result. However, the author had a story he wanted to tell and some economies of words were probably warranted.

This time out Aubrey doesn’t really have much chance to show off his sailing skills, instead he’s reduced to over-seeing the strategic situation. He must coordinate the various Royal Navy captains and the land forces to be used in the combined operations, something that turns out to be akin to ‘herding cats’.

When the actions come, the detail is fine and for the first time we see, through Stephen’s eyes, a British failure and what it costs them in man and material. O’Brian doesn’t spare us the gory details of the result of combat.

In the end, as in history, the Fleet succeeds – but not entirely by force of arms alone. Maturin runs what we’d now call ‘PsyOps” against the defending French forces and their allies. Many lose the will to fight and surrender outright.

I felt this was perhaps a lesser book in the series (having only read 4, maybe I’m not in a good position to judge yet), we catch up with a few old friends, some action occurs but not much changes for the main characters in the end. If you’re a fan by this stage you’ll read it regardless.