Patrick O'Brian

Book 3 of the Aubrey/Maturin series

H. M. S. Surprise

"Few, very few books have made my heart thud with excitement. H.M.S. Surprise managed it."—Helen Lucy Burke, Irish Press

Third in the series of Aubrey/Maturin adventures, this book is set among the strange sights and smells of the Indian subcontinent, and in the distant waters ploughed by the ships of the East India Company. Aubrey is on the defensive, pitting wits and seamanship against an enemy enjoying overwhelming local superiority. But somewhere in the Indian Ocean lies the prize that could make him rich beyond his wildest dream: the ships sent by Napoleon to attack the China Fleet...

"O'Brian is astonishingly good."—Times [London]

In addition to twenty volumes in the highly respected Aubrey/Maturin series, Patrick O'Brian's many books include Testimonies, The Golden Ocean, and The Unknown Shore. O'Brian also wrote acclaimed biographies of Pablo Picasso and Sir Joseph Banks and translated many works from the French, among them the novels and memoirs of Simone de Beauvoir and Jean Lacouture's biographies of Charles de Gaulle. He passed away in January 2000 at the age of 85.

Originally published in 1973
1991 / paperback / ISBN 0-393-30761-1
1994 / hardcover / ISBN 0-393-03703-7
6" x 8" / 380 pages / Fiction