by Patrick O'Brian
Well chalk up another 752 pages right before the end of the year. These were two pretty great stories.
Treason's Harbour is one of the best in the series so far. It features a lot of the Stephen Maturin counter-intelligence dealings that I so enjoy. What is maddening for us the reader is that we know who the mole in the British ranks is, yet Stephen has not figured it out. As such we are included in meetings where the French and British Judas (as they like to say in the series) are discussing how best to rid themselves of Admiral Harte, Jack, Stephen, and Mrs. Fielding (who is being used to try to spy on Stephen. Yet she and Stephen have come to an agreement where he will help her feed false information while they make it convincing by pretending to be lovers.) Jack and ship are sent on two missions, both are rigged to end his life. Both fail. It's interesting to see how the different officials in the book explain the failures in intelligence.
The Far Side of the World picks up almost right after the previous book. From Gibraltar Jack travels across the Atlantic and into the Pacific in search of an American ship that is harassing British Whalers. They take a few prizes but there is no action to speak of. Stephen falls off the ship at one point in the story, Jack dives in to rescue him and this being nighttime they are not noticed and float for a day before being picked up by natives. Near the end of the book they catch up with their prey though not all is as it seems.
One of the more humorous exchanges in the book occurs when Jack is talking to a fellow captain, Dundas about how Captain Baker of the Iris (which means rainbow in Greek) is assembling a crew with colored last names and then dresses them in the like color. He was trying to poach a forcastleman called Blew to join Green, Brown, Black, White, Gray and Scarlet!
I vaguely remember seeing the movie
of the same name, though I do remember the impression of not liking it. In fact I remember having the impression that it had no beginning and no real end. Why would they make a movie out of the 10th book in a series of 20!Both books end with what seems to be a new turn to O'Brian's writing style. They end rather abruptly. Some kind of game changing event happens in the last few pages or last page in the case of The Far Side of the World and then you are left wondering, what just happened. It's good to set the stage for the next book but maddeningly frustrating. Well I for one will be racing out to start the next book in the series.
