H.M.S. Surprise

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 dreams: the ships sent by Napoleon to attack the China Fleet. "O'Brian is astonishingly good." -- Times Patrick O'Brian (1914-2000) was born Richard Patrick Russ in England. During WWII he and his wife were involved in British secret-service activities. After the war he changed his name to Patrick O'Brian. He began his career as a novelist, biographer, and translator. Starting in the 1990s, Mr. O'Brian, then in his seventies, achieved the critical and popular recognition that was his due. Simon Vance, winner of Earphones Awards and the prestigious Audie Award in 2006, was born in England and worked for ten years for the BBC as a radio news announcer and as a narrator for the Royal National Institute for the Blind. Besides narrating, he is involved in numerous stage-acting projects in the United States and Europe.