Product Description

1793, the eve of the Napoleonic Wars, and Midshipman Horatio Hornblower receives his first command … As a seventeen-year-old with a touch of sea sickness, young Horatio Hornblower hardly cuts a dash in His Majesty’s navy. Yet from the moment he is ordered to board a French merchant ship in the Bay of Biscay and take command of crew and cargo, he proves his seafaring mettle on the waves. With a character-forming duel, several chases and some strange tavern encounters, the young Hornblower is soon forged into a formidable man of the sea. This is the first of eleven books chronicling the nautical adventures of C. S. Forester’s inimitable hero, Horatio Hornblower.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #60333 in Books
• Published on: 2006-10-05
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 320 pages

About the Author
C.S Forester was born in Cairo in 1899, where his father was stationed as a government official. He studied medicine at Guy’s Hospital, and after leaving Guy’s without a degree he turned to writing as a career. On the outbreak of war he entered the Ministry of Information and later he sailed with the Royal Navy to collect material for The Ship. He made a voyage to the Bering Sea to gather material for a similar book on the United States Navy, and it was during this trip that he was stricken with arteriosclerosis, a disease which left him crippled. However, he continued to write and in the Hornblower novels created the most renowned sailor in contemporary fiction. He died in 1966.

Customer Reviews

Exciting Short Stories about Hornblower's First Voyages
Mr. Midshipman Hornblower is the prequel to the Horatio Hornblower series. Written as the sixth book chronologically, it covers the very first times when Hornblower served in His Majesty's navy. My recommendation is that you read it first, so that you can follow Hornblower chronologically along over his career as it develops.

Since much of service aboard a naval vessel is routine, C.S. Forester gives us the high spots of Hornblower's first years in the form of short stories beginning at age 17 when he entered the navy.

Each story is nicely balanced among the following qualities: Hornblower's inexperience; the rapid shift of circumstances that can occur at sea; Hornblower's physical and psychological weaknesses and courage to overcome them; the demands of honor; the importance of thinking clearly, getting good information, and making a swift decision; the benefits of discipline; and the brotherhood of all seaman before the dangers they face.

Those who are interested in the war between Britain and France after the French Revolution in 1789 will find the material to bring those events to life in a vivid way. I learned a lot about the details of naval warfare as it was conducted then.

The weakness of most short story writers is that their plots and resolutions often become overly predictable. These short stories are predictable only in their originality and unpredictability. As such, I found myself drawn forward, wondering what rabbit Forester would next pull out of the hat.

This is just the sort of book that I loved to read as a teenager, and I could feel the years peeling off as I raced through the stories. This book would be a wonderful gift to a teenager who likes adventure tales based on historical events. Readers will be reminded of how embarrassing and emotionally daunting it can be to launch off to operate in the adult world at age 17.

Unlike many adventure books, Hornblower serves the dual role of hero and morally-inspired man. It's too bad that so much modern fiction chooses to develop the action without developing any character in the process.

Swashbucklin' Adventures
Action packed short stories following the young Mr Hornblower as he steps out into the world from his relatively humble beginnings.

Fast paced, concise and littered with naval terminology - It gave me a real sense of being in the midst of his life as he forges close friendships and deadly enemies.

It's like Sharpe on water!

Buy it and plunge into the world of a tense Europe where the Royal Navy rules the waves and the French army dominates the continent. Ideal for those interested in naval history at the birth of the Napoleonic Wars and for those who like action packed novels similar to Bernard Cornwell's Sharpe series.