Master & commander, by Patrick O'Brian

How did I get on with Patrick O'Brian, an author and a genre that I have been rather sniffy about in the past? Very well indeed is the reply, thank 'ee kindly (that of course is one of the problems with reading historical fiction - read too much of it, and you end up sounding like an eighteenth-century midshipman).

Certainly it is true that you do not need to understand very much about the technicalities of sailing ships, which is one of the fears that have put me off this kind of book in the past.  400 pages later, I still do not know what a studdingsail is, or where you would find the mizzen. Although there is a good deal of technical detail, you can glide over it and not lose very much of the narrative. It was a romping good read, excellent for the Christmas period, when I want to escape from the festivities and jollities into a different world. This one is set in and around Minorca, familiar from family holidays, and many many miles away from where I was sitting to read. (One of the problems with reading, say, Dickens, over Christmas is that the world you are reading about looks not unlike the world outside your window). It is quite a long book but gallops along at a decent speed, and I did want to read on and on and see what happened next. I am not so sure that, if I had laid the book aside for a week or two, I would ever have gone back to it; and I am quite sure that I am not such a fan as to embark immediately upon the next nineteen (nineteen!) books in the series. But maybe I will read another one in a while.

Since starting this book I have reverted to an old habit, of reading a chapter each night in bed before I settle to sleep. It is the only way that I can read a book reasonably quickly, as I never seem to find the time and opportunity to read during the day. I never thought I would say this, but in some ways I miss the commute, which was when I used to get my reading time. However, this book wasn't ideal for bedtimes - it is hard to sleep just after reading about a fierce encounter with a xebec-frigate, shot whistling through the rigging, thundering broadsides and desperate hand-to-hand fighting. So for my next book I shall look for something a little calmer, though I do not as yet know what.