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Aubrey & Maturin #14
The Nutmeg of Consolation: An unforgettable historical action adventure novel
Patrick O’Brian’s Aubrey-Maturin tales are widely acknowledged to be the greatest series of historical novels ever written. Now, for the first time, they are available in electronic book format, so a whole new generation of readers can be swept away on the adventure of a lifetime. This is the fourteenth book in the series.
Patrick O’Brian is regarded by many as the greatest living historical novelist writing in English. In The Nutmeg of Consolation, Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin begin stranded on an uninhabited island in the Dutch East Indies, attacked by ferocious Malay pirates. They contrive their escape, but after a stay in Batavia and a change of ship, they are caught up in a night chase in the fiercely tidal waters and then embroiled in the much more insidious conflicts of the terrifying penal settlements of New South Wales. It is one of O’Brian’s most accomplished and gripping books.
373 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1991
453 people are currently reading
2891 people want to read
About the author
Patrick O'Brian
214 books2,425 followersPatrick O'Brian's acclaimed Aubrey-Maturin series of historical novels has been described as "a masterpiece" (David Mamet, New York Times), "addictively readable" (Patrick T. Reardon, Chicago Tribune), and "the best historical novels ever written" (Richard Snow, New York Times Book Review), which "should have been on those lists of the greatest novels of the 20th century" (George Will).
Set in the Royal Navy during the Napoleonic Wars, O'Brian's twenty-volume series centers on the enduring friendship between naval officer Jack Aubrey and physician (and spy) Stephen Maturin. The Far Side of the World, the tenth book in the series, was adapted into a 2003 film directed by Peter Weir and starring Russell Crowe and Paul Bettany. The film was nominated for ten Oscars, including Best Picture. The books are now available in hardcover, paperback, and e-book format.
In addition to the Aubrey-Maturin novels, Patrick O'Brian wrote several books including the novels Testimonies, The Golden Ocean, and The Unknown Shore, as well as biographies of Joseph Banks and Picasso. He translated many works from French into English, among them the novels and memoirs of Simone de Beauvoir, the first volume of Jean Lacouture's biography of Charles de Gaulle, and famed fugitive Henri Cherriere's memoir Papillon. O'Brian died in January 2000.
The Aubrey-Maturin Series on Goodreads
Set in the Royal Navy during the Napoleonic Wars, O'Brian's twenty-volume series centers on the enduring friendship between naval officer Jack Aubrey and physician (and spy) Stephen Maturin. The Far Side of the World, the tenth book in the series, was adapted into a 2003 film directed by Peter Weir and starring Russell Crowe and Paul Bettany. The film was nominated for ten Oscars, including Best Picture. The books are now available in hardcover, paperback, and e-book format.
In addition to the Aubrey-Maturin novels, Patrick O'Brian wrote several books including the novels Testimonies, The Golden Ocean, and The Unknown Shore, as well as biographies of Joseph Banks and Picasso. He translated many works from French into English, among them the novels and memoirs of Simone de Beauvoir, the first volume of Jean Lacouture's biography of Charles de Gaulle, and famed fugitive Henri Cherriere's memoir Papillon. O'Brian died in January 2000.
The Aubrey-Maturin Series on Goodreads
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 357 reviews
November 13, 2025
In The Nutmeg of Consolation you get shipwrecks, pirates, and duels fought for honor. With content like that, some might expect a dime-store novel in The Nutmeg of Consolation, but when it's Patrick "the Jane Austen of historical fiction" O'Brian, you get treated to high quality writing. A literary adventure, if you will!
Book #14 in the series picks up where The Thirteen-Gun Salute left off. The crew is stranded on a remote island in the Malaysia/Indonesia seas. Things get dicey when the natives attack. But fortune is on the side of Captain Aubrey, who is able to continue on with his mission through grit and ingenuity. Eventually they land in New Holland, present day Australia, where the reminder of the book plays out.
If you've read these novels from book one to this point and you like this brand of well-written, action-adventure coupled with examinations of human behavior, perhaps you too would rate this as 5-stars worth of perfection. The book gives fans everything they could want: plenty of Jack and Stephen moments, some fighting, clever sailors overcoming odds, natural philosophy, a tender moment or two, the return of memorable characters and of course O'Brian's beautiful descriptions. Although the initial quandary is resolved a third of the way in, the rest is a description of Australia during its horrible transportation days paired with Stephen carrying out an important task, which rights an oversight of his from a previous book. This has to do with his assistant, Padeen Colman. Nutmeg's storyline may not create a sense of action in the final half, but the important urgency of the task carries us sailing too swiftly to the end. The ending always comes too soon for me with these books!
My review of book 13, The Thirteen Gun Salute: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
My review of book 15, The Truelove: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
Book #14 in the series picks up where The Thirteen-Gun Salute left off. The crew is stranded on a remote island in the Malaysia/Indonesia seas. Things get dicey when the natives attack. But fortune is on the side of Captain Aubrey, who is able to continue on with his mission through grit and ingenuity. Eventually they land in New Holland, present day Australia, where the reminder of the book plays out.
If you've read these novels from book one to this point and you like this brand of well-written, action-adventure coupled with examinations of human behavior, perhaps you too would rate this as 5-stars worth of perfection. The book gives fans everything they could want: plenty of Jack and Stephen moments, some fighting, clever sailors overcoming odds, natural philosophy, a tender moment or two, the return of memorable characters and of course O'Brian's beautiful descriptions. Although the initial quandary is resolved a third of the way in, the rest is a description of Australia during its horrible transportation days paired with Stephen carrying out an important task, which rights an oversight of his from a previous book. This has to do with his assistant, Padeen Colman. Nutmeg's storyline may not create a sense of action in the final half, but the important urgency of the task carries us sailing too swiftly to the end. The ending always comes too soon for me with these books!
My review of book 13, The Thirteen Gun Salute: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
My review of book 15, The Truelove: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
September 29, 2017
“I read novels with the utmost pertinacity. I look upon them - I look upon good novels - as a very valuable part of literature, conveying more exact and finely-distinguished knowledge of the human heart and mind than almost any other, with greater breadth and depth and fewer constraints.”
― Patrick O'Brian, The Nutmeg of Consolation
For action, this book is a bit light. There is a bit of fighting when the crew of the shipwrecked HMS Diane are trying to building a schooner. Tobacco and alcohol might soon run out and the ship is nearing St. Famine's day (not marked by a famine of food, but smokes and booze). Things might get rough. After losing a few members heading off an attack of some local pirates, they eventually chase down a French ship. I won't give those details away. However, after that, the book ends up in Australia (New South Wales) where Dr. Maturin contemplates happiness, money, family and addition. He also confronts the harsh conditions in New South Wales, where everything has been degraded by the penal colony economy.
It might have been a 3-star (the first?) book, if not for the beautiful musings of Stephen throughout. I really do love these novels.
― Patrick O'Brian, The Nutmeg of Consolation
For action, this book is a bit light. There is a bit of fighting when the crew of the shipwrecked HMS Diane are trying to building a schooner. Tobacco and alcohol might soon run out and the ship is nearing St. Famine's day (not marked by a famine of food, but smokes and booze). Things might get rough. After losing a few members heading off an attack of some local pirates, they eventually chase down a French ship. I won't give those details away. However, after that, the book ends up in Australia (New South Wales) where Dr. Maturin contemplates happiness, money, family and addition. He also confronts the harsh conditions in New South Wales, where everything has been degraded by the penal colony economy.
It might have been a 3-star (the first?) book, if not for the beautiful musings of Stephen throughout. I really do love these novels.
February 2, 2022
Oh what a glorious name for a tight, sweet, newly coppered, broad-buttocked little ship, a solace to any man’s heart. The Nutmeg for daily use: of Consolation for official papers. Dear Nutmeg ! What joy.’
At the end of the previous novel in the series, Captain Jack Aubrey is shipwrecked on an unmapped reef, losing the ship ‘Diane’ that he sailed in from England to the islands of Borneo. With help from the surviving crew and with materials salvaged from the wreck of ‘Diane’ Jack Aubrey is now building a cutter [a smaller sailing ship] on the shore of the island where they are marooned. Hopefully, the new ship will take them back to civilization, but that doesn’t take into account the gruesome attack by local cannibals and the dwindling food [and alcohol] reserves.
Still, with a little help from providence and from Dr Maturin’s medical expertise, everybody gets safely back to Batavia [Jakarta] where Governor Raffles offers then a new ship in compensation [consolation]. Enchanted with the gift, Captain Aubrey names it with one of the honorifics for the Sultan visited in the previous novel.
The journey around the globe can finally resume, but not before another dangerous, devious and blood splattered battle against the bigger French frigate Cornelie . Jack Aubrey is seriously outgunned, but he hopes his skills in deceptive camouflage and his talent for getting the best out of sail, wind, gunpowder and human flesh can prevail.
With the topgallantsmasts on the booms and the Nutmeg safely out of sight of the land, Jack said, ‘When we have furled everything but the topsails and foretopsail, we may proceed with our painted strips. But furled in the loose bunt, swagging horribly, with gaskets all ahoo, d’ye hear me there, Mr. Seymour,’ ...
A landlubber like me is never certain when the author is writing in earnest about the fine art of sailing or taking the piss by using deliberately obscure nautical terms. Knowing Patrick O’Brian’s wicked sense of humour and after reading fourteen of his adventures at sea, I believe both statements are valid: the accuracy of the statement and the insider joke that he invites us to share.
As an extra argument for this, check out the running gag about how bad a ship can smell after years at sea. A problem solved with a little help from a device called a sweetening-cock
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This is one of the best episodes in the long-running series, anchored in the enduring friendship between two men of different temperaments, a man of action and a ‘natural-philosopher’ . Despite occasional disappointments and misunderstandings, Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin have a strong bond that goes beyond their common passion for classical music.
‘Another misery of human life,’ remarked Stephen to the morning darkness, ‘is having a contubernal that snores like ten.’
‘I was not snoring,’ said Jack. ‘I was wide awake. What is a contubernal?’
‘You are a contubernal.’
The secret ingredient that enlivens the series for me is the still fresh sense of wonder, in both Jack and Stephen and in many of the interesting people they come across in their voyages. Jack’s passion is manifested in his enthusiasm for the new ship under his command, in the sparkle in his eyes on the eve of battle and, why not, in his gluttony at the dinner table. Stephen’s interests are more varied and of a subtler nature, from the study of the natural world, to philosophy, medicine, psychology, literature and real world politics.
As a background to all these dramatic events unfolding in the lives of the two friends there is always the sea, a never-ending source of delight and terror in unpredictable turns of the wheel of fortune.
.. the extraordinary beauty of the sea and sky and the champagne quality of the air, uncommon between the tropics and almost unknown to Dr Maturin, never an early riser.
In another little sly move that adds sometimes humorous, sometime dramatic complications to the plot, Stephen is also interested in experimenting with mind-altering substances, initially laudanum and presently the chewing of coca leaves.
Aboard the ‘Surprise’ [Jack and Stephen transfer back to their old ship after the confrontation with the French] this habit results in the extremely strange behaviour of the numerous ship rats, after they raid the secret stash of coca leaves that Dr Maturin uses to calm his busy mind.
‘One of the miseries of medical life is that on the one hand you know what shocking things can happen to the human body and on the other you know how very little we can really do about most of them. You are therefore denied the comfort of faith.
Dr Maturin sombre declarations are provoked both by his own struggle with tropical fever, and by witnessing the ravages of European brought smallpox on the unprotected native populations of Melanesia: The ‘Surprise’ stops to pick up water at a remote island only to find everybody dead, except two young girls gone almost feral in the nearby jungle. Once again, the mix of pathos and humour plays at the heartstrings of the reader.
‘Jemmy Ducks, you are a family man, I believe?’ At the Captain’s wholly unusual ingratiating tone and smile Jemmy Ducks’ eyes narrowed and his face took on a reserved, suspicious expression; but after some hesitation he admitted that he had seven or eight of the little buggers over to Flicken, south by east of Shelmerston.
‘Are any of them girls?’
‘Three sir. No, I tell a lie. Four.’
‘Then I dare say you are used to their ways?’
‘Well you may say so, sir. Howling and screeching, teething and croup, thrust, red-gum, measles and belly-ache, and poor old Thurlow walking up and down rocking them in his arms all night and wondering dare he toss ‘em out of window ... Chamber-pots, pap-boats, swaddling clouts drying in the kitchen ... That’s why I signed on for a long, long voyage, sir.’
Able Sailor Jemmy Ducks is put in charge of the two little savages, proving once again that you can’t escape your Fate by running away. Soon, the whole crew will be enchanted by the children, enough to regret the necessity of putting them ashore when they finally arrive at their destination, in New South Wales.
The visit to the penal colony in Botany Bay offers scant occasion for making merry, despite an early invitation to dinner at the Governor’s House. Jack is struggling with the malicious and corrupt military regime who controls the supplies he needs for refitting the ship and for provisions for the next leg of the journey around the world. Stephen is unable to maintain his cool in the face of grave provocation and insults against his native Ireland, ending up in a duel with the offending officer.
Only the lure of the birds and animals native to Australia can offer some relief, and the chance meeting with a man of letters named Paulton. But Stephen cannot turn his eyes away from the cruelty the soldiers use in punishing the convicts, especially when one of the targets is his former assistant Padeen.
‘It may well be a country with a great future, but it is one with no present, apart from squalor, crime, and corruption. It may have a future for people like the Macarthurs and those infinitely hardy pioneers who can withstand loneliness, drought, flood and a generally ungrateful soil; but for most of today’s inhabitants it is a desolate wilderness: they take refuge in drink and in being cruel to one another.’
>>><<<>>><<<
The lively fruitful fluent pen of Patrick O’Brian has penned another great episode in this long running series. There is no shortage of complimentary comments about his style, about the thoroughness of his period research or about the compelling characterization. I will borrow from A S Byatt one of these, as eloquent as it is concise:
"An essential of the truly gripping book for the narrative addict is the creation of a whole, solidly living world for the imagination to inhabit, and O'Brian does with prodigal specificity and generosity."
I hope I will be able to embark on the ‘Surprise’ soon for the crossing of the Pacific and for finding out what new adventures await in Latin America, but before I close this fourteen chapter I have one more quote saved from the text, a discussion about the pertinacity of literary fiction that is as valid today as it was in 1812.
‘But I imagine, sir, that you read books on medicine, natural philosophy, perhaps history – that you do not read novels or plays.’
‘Sir, said Stephen, ‘I read novels with the utmost pertinacity. I look upon them – I look upon good novels – as a very valuable part of literature, conveying more exact and finely-distinguished knowledge of the human heart and mind than almost any other, with greater breadth and depth and fewer constraints. Had I not read Madame de La Fayette, the Abbe Prevost, and the man who wrote Clarissa, that extraordinary feat, I should be very much poorer than I am; and a moment’s reflection would add many more.’
March 11, 2010
This, the 14th volume in Patrick O'Brian's brilliant Aubrey-Maturin canon, is one of my absolute favorites of the twenty completed novels in this wonderful Napoleonic wars seafaring series. "The Nutmeg of Consolation" is a page-turner from page one on.
We join Captain Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin in the East Indies as they are rescued from a deserted island, acquire the beautifully Dutch-built small frigate the Nutmeg of Consolation, fight a running sea-battle with the much larger French frigate Cornelie, meet up with all of their chums aboard HMS Surprise, and then visit the penal colony of New South Wales in Australia. The action at sea and ashore is tense and engaging; as well as being full of the wonders of science and nature that Stephen and his friend Martin explore on the islands they visit and in the Australian outback.
This is a terrific book, and oh so cleverly plotted and written. All of the 'Aubrey-Maturin' novels are superb; and this particular episode just happens to be, in my opinion, one of the 'crown jewels' in the series. I unhesitatingly recommend this novel,as well as the entire series.
We join Captain Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin in the East Indies as they are rescued from a deserted island, acquire the beautifully Dutch-built small frigate the Nutmeg of Consolation, fight a running sea-battle with the much larger French frigate Cornelie, meet up with all of their chums aboard HMS Surprise, and then visit the penal colony of New South Wales in Australia. The action at sea and ashore is tense and engaging; as well as being full of the wonders of science and nature that Stephen and his friend Martin explore on the islands they visit and in the Australian outback.
This is a terrific book, and oh so cleverly plotted and written. All of the 'Aubrey-Maturin' novels are superb; and this particular episode just happens to be, in my opinion, one of the 'crown jewels' in the series. I unhesitatingly recommend this novel,as well as the entire series.
February 4, 2026
The Nutmeg Of Consolation is an adventure book with many nail biting scenes where you think that this is the end of our heroes. All through the novel there are many dangers from pirates, a French warship, and a sword fight instigated by a bigot that pushed Maturin to his breaking point. The book ends in the penal colony of New South Wales that allows for Maturin and his assistant Martin to observe the wildlife including the platypus. What was interesting in this book was the effects of drugs like opium and coca leaves on a crewman who becomes addicted to opium and the rats that get into Maturin's coca stash. The addicted crewman Padeen gets transported to New South Wales for theft and the rats begin to violently attack each other as they go through withdrawal. Patrick O' Brian is a great wordsmith that paints a vivid picture of life on the high seas during the Napoleonic wars with many fascinating characters.
December 20, 2021
Read this book in 2009, and its the 14th beautiful volume of the great "Aubrey/ Maturin" series.
In this tale Captain Jack Aubrey, after his former ship "Diane" was shipwrecked at the Dutch East Indies, but thanks to the ingenuity by Maturin, they have now this new ship the "Nutmeg", and they are setting sail towards the dreadful penal colony, New South Wales.
Here in this penal colony Maturin's Irish temper will provoke a diplomatic crisis between him and certain people who are ruling there in Australia.
What also will happen is an almost fatal encounter with wildlife in the Australian outback, and that will cause some dangerous and horrific moments.
In the end Aubrey and Maturin will save themselves from the authorities in Australia as well as from the wildlife with the important help from certain people, and all this is brought to us in a most wonderful and authentic fashion by the author.
Highly recommended, for this is another terrific addition to this excellent series, and that's why I like to call this episode: "An Amazing Nutmeg Journey"!
In this tale Captain Jack Aubrey, after his former ship "Diane" was shipwrecked at the Dutch East Indies, but thanks to the ingenuity by Maturin, they have now this new ship the "Nutmeg", and they are setting sail towards the dreadful penal colony, New South Wales.
Here in this penal colony Maturin's Irish temper will provoke a diplomatic crisis between him and certain people who are ruling there in Australia.
What also will happen is an almost fatal encounter with wildlife in the Australian outback, and that will cause some dangerous and horrific moments.
In the end Aubrey and Maturin will save themselves from the authorities in Australia as well as from the wildlife with the important help from certain people, and all this is brought to us in a most wonderful and authentic fashion by the author.
Highly recommended, for this is another terrific addition to this excellent series, and that's why I like to call this episode: "An Amazing Nutmeg Journey"!
March 3, 2021
Cosa posso scrivere, io, adesso, a proposito del quattordicesimo episodio della serie, senza spoilerare e soprattutto senza essere ripetitiva rispetto le lodi che ho già scritto nei precedenti commenti?
Risposta: niente. Non sono mica O'Brian, che con ingredienti tutti già ben noti e seguendo uno schema già ben noto, riesce a scrivere ogni volta una storia diversa e che ha sempre la semplicità di un pane appena sfornato e la freschezza dell'aria del mattino. E questa volta ci aggiunge persino un pizzico di noce moscata.
Risposta: niente. Non sono mica O'Brian, che con ingredienti tutti già ben noti e seguendo uno schema già ben noto, riesce a scrivere ogni volta una storia diversa e che ha sempre la semplicità di un pane appena sfornato e la freschezza dell'aria del mattino. E questa volta ci aggiunge persino un pizzico di noce moscata.
June 20, 2017
Intelligently written. Good story. Interesting characters. Unsure about the characters, they seem a little bit to complex for sailors...
July 9, 2013
SPOILERS BELOW.
This particular edition to the series may well have been entitled "When Maturin, Cannibals and Platypuses Attack." This (and the previous book in the series) is rather meandering and doesn't seem to have much in the way of a concrete objective in terms of where the author wanted to take the characters, but it's Patrick O'Brain, so who cares? His descriptive detail, the viewpoints of the characters, (mostly and seemingly increasingly from Maturin), the vast knowledge of contemporary technology, proceedings, and customs, as well as just the feeling of having been taken back in time, does more than enough to compel one to read this series. As the saying goes, it's the journey, not the destination, which is just as well, because when O'Brian brings his books to a close, he doesn't do so by gently closing the door so much as yanking out the plug. May he rest in peace.
This particular edition to the series may well have been entitled "When Maturin, Cannibals and Platypuses Attack." This (and the previous book in the series) is rather meandering and doesn't seem to have much in the way of a concrete objective in terms of where the author wanted to take the characters, but it's Patrick O'Brain, so who cares? His descriptive detail, the viewpoints of the characters, (mostly and seemingly increasingly from Maturin), the vast knowledge of contemporary technology, proceedings, and customs, as well as just the feeling of having been taken back in time, does more than enough to compel one to read this series. As the saying goes, it's the journey, not the destination, which is just as well, because when O'Brian brings his books to a close, he doesn't do so by gently closing the door so much as yanking out the plug. May he rest in peace.
April 25, 2013
A little slower and little more self-indulgent than some of the previous entries, but a delight from start to finish, as always. The early part, on the island, put me in mind of Far Side of the World (only better than what we find in that installment), and the return to India (which was very enjoyable in the previous book) and the exploration of Australia was lovely. Not too many sea battles here, but it’s perhaps funnier than any of the previous books. Wonderful to finally get back to the Surprise, but I must say that I hold a special place in my heart for the Nutmeg, and I hope we haven’t seen the last of her.
October 12, 2025
The odd title of this, the 14th book in series, is derived from the name of the ship Jack Aubrey is given after the loss of his previous ship to a typhoon. I hope there really was a small frigate with this ridiculous name; I don't want to think O'Brian is that bereft of ship names. Silly name not withstanding, the book flows with all the 19th century flavor we expect; the characters are solid and familiar, and Aubrey & Maturin enjoy a new string of adventures including a visit to the penal colony at Botany Bay.
August 27, 2017
The one with the lady pirate, the cannibals, Australia, and the platypus. A very Stephen-centric novel, but without the spying and intrigue. Lots of interesting info about the New South Wales section of Australia, and a creepy new fact about the cuddly platypus.
June 12, 2023
Another amazing journey between jeopardies to life, limb and family fortune, culminating in an ill-fated visit to the bleakly tyrannical colony at Botany Bay in Australia for HMS HMPMoW Surprise.
Yeah, all right mate, don't get too troppo now...
Yeah, all right mate, don't get too troppo now...
September 28, 2018
Aubrey and Maturin are at it again! Sailing the high seas, fighting the French (and miscellaneous jerks), saving children, finding rare creatures, curing ailments, and generally being surrogate parents to a slightly disreputable family of sailors. Their domesticity repeatedly verges upon the romantic in this instalment: Stephen is struck by the blueness of Jack’s eyes; Jack is jealous of Martin for taking up Stephen’s time. ‘The Nutmeg of Consolation’ proved to be another wonderful tale of their adventures, spent entirely abroad and mostly at sea. Killick can as usual be relied upon to provide great amusement, while violence ashore and at sea creates tension. O’Brian is such a reliably excellent writer. This is the fourteenth book in the series - I am so flighty a reader that the last sequence I got so far with was probably the Animorphs, back in my teens. I usually lose interest after perhaps three books, but could hardly do so with such lovable characters and beautifully rendered historical settings. The plots, honestly, are of much less interest to me, although they are very well crafted. My favourite moments are generally those that show the characters at quiet times, rather than during chases and battles. A few particularly pleasing lines of dialogue follow:
Other highlights include: And that is an abbreviated list! I laughed a number of times while reading this book on the train. There is nothing like an Aubrey and Maturin novel for good cheer.
”My dear Maturin, how very happy I am to see you! We had given you up for lost. I trust you are well?”
“Perfectly well, I thank you, Governor; only a little ruffled,” said Stephen, whose face was indeed somewhat less sallow than usual. “The sergeant offered me fourpence to go away.”
[...]
“Lord, Raffles,” cried his wife, coming in, “What is that very ill smell? Has something died behind the wainscot?”
“My dear,” said the Governor, “It is this new plant, which is to be named after Dr Maturin.”
[...]
“It would I am sure be indiscreet to ask why you were turned before the mast,” said the Dutch lady most at home in English.
“Well, ma’am,” said Jack with an engaging leer, “it was partly due to my devotion to the sex, but even more because I stole the captain’s tripe.”
“Sex?” cried the Dutch ladies, “Tripe?” They whispered among themselves, blushed, looked very grave, and fell silent.
[...]
“You are luckier than I am in that way. They do not look upon you with any respect. That is to say, not with any undue respect. I mean they have an amazing respect for you, of course; but they do not look upon you as a superior being.”
“Do they not? They certainly looked upon me as a very disagreeable one this afternoon. I was cursed sullen, snappish and dogged with them all.”
“You astonish me. Had something put you out?”
“I had set aside a corpse for opening, an interesting case of the marthambles; I was going to ask your good word as duty bound, but before I could do so some criminal or at least some busy hand had sewn it up and placed it among those you buried.”
“What a ghoul you are, Stephen, upon my word.”
[...]
Killick came in and stood breathing heavily in the doorway and looking disagreeable. They took no notice, intent upon their letters; he came forward to the table and moved some knives and forks, quite unnecessarily, and with unnecessary noise.
“Get out, Killick,” said Jack, without looking round.
“Killick, you break in upon my thoughts,” said Stephen.
“Which I only came to say that the cook has burnt the soup, the Doctor ain’t shaved yet, and your honour has spilt ink on your breeches, your only decent breeches.”
“God’s blood - hell and death, so I have,” cried Jack.
[...]
“You may recall that last time we had the happiness of walking in the Brazilian rainforest I was bitten by an owl-faced night ape.”
“Certainly I do. How you bled!”
“This time I was bitten by a tapir, and bled even more.”
“A tapir, for all love?”
Other highlights include: And that is an abbreviated list! I laughed a number of times while reading this book on the train. There is nothing like an Aubrey and Maturin novel for good cheer.
August 14, 2020
It seems strange to me considering how I felt when I first came to them, but these days the Aubrey-Maturin books give me a particular kind of comfortable joy. There may be much that is similar in the stories that span the many volumes, but this very familiarity is a part of what I am drawn to and I would still argue that this great mega-novel certainly has both a story and characters that develop and grow regardless of how familiar they may remain.
In this installment we take up where we left off: the crew of the HMS Diane marooned on a remote island working hard to build a schooner from the wreckage. The arrival of native pirates, led by a beautiful young woman, leads to a bloody battle that ultimately leaves the hopes of the sailors dashed until a lucky meeting with a Chinese junk saves them all from starvation. Returning to Batavia, Aubrey is granted access to a newly refurbished ship, the titular Nutmeg of Consolation, which he sails to meet up with our old friend Tom Pullings who is commanding his first love, the Surprise. Ultimately our heroes reach their interim destination of New South Wales and we are here treated to O’Brian’s picture of a dismal penal colony suffering under rank corruption on the one hand and ineffective leadership on the other. Thwarted at nearly every turn in his attempts to resupply and repair his beloved Surprise, Aubrey is further hampered when Maturin finds himself drawn into an impromptu duel with one of the more nefarious of the corrupt leaders of the colony.
Several intriguing sub-plots help to fill out the novel, one being a short stopover on an island ravaged by smallpox where two unlikely, though endearing, crewmembers are found; as well as the dismal plight of poor Padeen who had been sent to Australia after his laudanum addiction had led him to commit theft and we see that the circumstances for the Australian convicts are dismal indeed…especially if they happen to be Irish Catholics. One final misadventure with the ‘water-mole’, or platypus as it is more commonly known, once again points out that Maturin’s passion for natural philosophy might indeed prove to be the end of him.
In this installment we take up where we left off: the crew of the HMS Diane marooned on a remote island working hard to build a schooner from the wreckage. The arrival of native pirates, led by a beautiful young woman, leads to a bloody battle that ultimately leaves the hopes of the sailors dashed until a lucky meeting with a Chinese junk saves them all from starvation. Returning to Batavia, Aubrey is granted access to a newly refurbished ship, the titular Nutmeg of Consolation, which he sails to meet up with our old friend Tom Pullings who is commanding his first love, the Surprise. Ultimately our heroes reach their interim destination of New South Wales and we are here treated to O’Brian’s picture of a dismal penal colony suffering under rank corruption on the one hand and ineffective leadership on the other. Thwarted at nearly every turn in his attempts to resupply and repair his beloved Surprise, Aubrey is further hampered when Maturin finds himself drawn into an impromptu duel with one of the more nefarious of the corrupt leaders of the colony.
Several intriguing sub-plots help to fill out the novel, one being a short stopover on an island ravaged by smallpox where two unlikely, though endearing, crewmembers are found; as well as the dismal plight of poor Padeen who had been sent to Australia after his laudanum addiction had led him to commit theft and we see that the circumstances for the Australian convicts are dismal indeed…especially if they happen to be Irish Catholics. One final misadventure with the ‘water-mole’, or platypus as it is more commonly known, once again points out that Maturin’s passion for natural philosophy might indeed prove to be the end of him.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 31, 2026
From ship wreck in the South China Sea to bullshit politics in Sydney Cove (with a most excellent duel), then off to Bird Island (and a run in with the spur of a platypus), The Nutmeg of Consolation is a cracking yarn in the Aubrey/Maturin series.
It is one of the titles I think of as "cozy". So much fun to read that you need a snifter of port, a hound at your feet, a roaring fire, and snow piled up outside your window to complete the scene.
O'Brian was at his comfortable best by the time he hit this fourteenth book, and the more we fly along with him and the men of what once again gets to be the H.M.S. Surprise (if you know you know; if you don't, start reading the series), the more lived in the world becomes.
I used to rate this lower than I do now, but I am not even sure I can give any of these books less than a five star rating anymore (though I am holding firm at a four at the moment). The main reason for this is that The Nutmeg of Consolation isn't really a novel. It is merely a chapter in what is truly an epic odyssey. The Aubrey/Maturin books are one big story, and this is but a scene amongst many.
And a thrilling scene at that.
It is one of the titles I think of as "cozy". So much fun to read that you need a snifter of port, a hound at your feet, a roaring fire, and snow piled up outside your window to complete the scene.
O'Brian was at his comfortable best by the time he hit this fourteenth book, and the more we fly along with him and the men of what once again gets to be the H.M.S. Surprise (if you know you know; if you don't, start reading the series), the more lived in the world becomes.
I used to rate this lower than I do now, but I am not even sure I can give any of these books less than a five star rating anymore (though I am holding firm at a four at the moment). The main reason for this is that The Nutmeg of Consolation isn't really a novel. It is merely a chapter in what is truly an epic odyssey. The Aubrey/Maturin books are one big story, and this is but a scene amongst many.
And a thrilling scene at that.
May 28, 2011
Great historical fiction, only passingly good fiction. A fun read, nonetheless.
The usual suspects maneuvered around the western Pacific to touch on as many real--or realistic--situations as possible. Some sub-plots better developed than others, but surely the Aubery-Maturin true believers will love it all.
O'Brian resisted the temptation to leave us hanging from another cliff.
The usual suspects maneuvered around the western Pacific to touch on as many real--or realistic--situations as possible. Some sub-plots better developed than others, but surely the Aubery-Maturin true believers will love it all.
O'Brian resisted the temptation to leave us hanging from another cliff.
January 15, 2023
A conferma del fatto che il precedente romanzo,
Rotta a Oriente
(letto ad agosto 2022), non avesse suscitato in me una durevole impressione (di fatto il primo passo falso della saga), non ricordavo assolutamente nulla di dove avremmo ripreso la storia e ho dovuto consultare la voce di Wikipedia con il riassunto della trama.
Jack era partito a bordo della Surprise (che ora è di proprietà di Stephen) alla volta del Sud America, dove grazie all'abilità del chirurgo/agente segreto si spera di soffiare sul fuoco di ribellione che serpeggia nelle colonie spagnole. Ma, giunti in Portogallo, i due vengono richiamati in Inghilterra perché nel frattempo possono essere più utili altrove: Jack viene reintegrato nella Royal Navy con tante scuse e gli viene affidato il comando della Diane, che dovrà scortare il diplomatico britannico Fox in Malesia, per concludere un trattato con il sovrano di un piccolo ma strategicamente importante staterello prima che lo faccia la missione francese che contemporaneamente si sta dirigendo a quella volta. In Malesia, la missione ha successo (e vengono anche regolati un po' di conti del passato: non dico di più), e Stephen ha anche il tempo di fare interessanti osservazioni naturalistiche. Giunto il momento di ripartire verso casa, la nave si incaglia su uno scoglio non segnato sulle mappe a poca distanza da un'isola disabitata: Fox, impaziente di consegnare l'accordo siglato, non aspetta le necessarie riparazioni e, visto che Batavia non è poi così lontana, decide di ripartire con parte dell'equipaggio su un'imbarcazione più piccola, mentre Jack, Stephen e il resto degli uomini rimangono sull'isola a riparare la Diane. Tutto a posto? No, perché un inaspettato e violentissimo tifone distrugge completamente la nave incagliata, oltre a far affondare presumibilmente l'imbarcazione su cui erano salpati Fox e gli altri sfortunati uomini. Quindi ora siamo bloccati per chissà quanto su quest'isola deserta.
Così si concludeva Rotta a Oriente, e così riparte questo Caccia notturna, puntata n. 14 della serie. È un libro che mi è piaciuto molto di più, specialmente, cosa che mi capita spesso, nelle parti più "terricole" (sull'isola deserta e soprattutto, negli ultimi capitoli del libro, ), anche se la bella "caccia notturna" sul mare del titolo domina la parte centrale del libro: una caccia anomala in cui la nuova nave di Jack, la Nutmeg, veste i panni della preda nei confronti della francese Cornélie, mentre in realtà la sta attirando in una trappola: la varietà di situazioni e di piani che O'Brian riesce a escogitare è sempre impressionante (tra parentesi, il titolo italiano fa pensare che sia questo l'episodio più importante del libro, ma in realtà non è così: d'altra parte quello originale è The Nutmeg of Consolation, che sarebbe appunto il nome della nuova nave di Jack dopo la perdita della Diane, ma riprenderlo fedelmente e intitolare il libro "La Noce moscata di consolazione" era effettivamente improponibile).
C'è comunque sempre qualche difettuccio che si ripresenta ormai da un po', e segnatamente che per buona parte degli ultimi libri Jack e Stephen conducono esistenze pressocché parallele (Jack impegnato nel governo della nave sul mare o in porto, Stephen in giro con il simpatico reverendo Martin a studiare la fauna e la flora locali) che si incontrano raramente: ci sono sì scene in cui i due si ritrovano nella cabina del comandante a chiacchierare, mangiare o suonare, ma sono brevi e non aggiungono molto, per il lettore, al loro rapporto di amicizia, il cuore della serie. Anzi, quasi quasi, più che queste scene che ormai seguono schemi già ben noti, stavolta mi sono piaciuti i rapidi sketch con i personaggi secondari dell'equipaggio, Killick su tutti e altri marinai di contorno.
Anche per questo ho apprezzato molto la parte finale del libro, che si svolge , dove O'Brian, oltre a dipingere un quadro vivido e brutale della realtà del luogo all'epoca (la sua fonte principale, come dice nella nota finale, è stato il bellissimo The Fatal Shore di Robert Hughes), introduce inaspettatamente un , butta lì numerosi accenni a un Jack piuttosto provato fisicamente dalle fatiche e dallo stress del viaggio che fanno un po' preoccupare me e Stephen, e infine svela un'importante novità nella vita privata di quest'ultimo di cui sicuramente si saprà di più nei prossimi libri.
Siamo a -6 libri dalla conclusione (perché mi sembra che il ventunesimo libro sia rimasto incompiuto) e, anche a giudicare dai titoli, ci dovremmo prima o poi riavvicinare a mari più conosciuti: lo spero perché secondo me la serie generalmente dà il suo meglio quando Jack e Stephen si trovano nel teatro principale del conflitto. Inoltre, dopo gli ultimi libri incentrati su Stephen, mi piacerebbe che il prossimo avesse più Jack come protagonista.
Jack era partito a bordo della Surprise (che ora è di proprietà di Stephen) alla volta del Sud America, dove grazie all'abilità del chirurgo/agente segreto si spera di soffiare sul fuoco di ribellione che serpeggia nelle colonie spagnole. Ma, giunti in Portogallo, i due vengono richiamati in Inghilterra perché nel frattempo possono essere più utili altrove: Jack viene reintegrato nella Royal Navy con tante scuse e gli viene affidato il comando della Diane, che dovrà scortare il diplomatico britannico Fox in Malesia, per concludere un trattato con il sovrano di un piccolo ma strategicamente importante staterello prima che lo faccia la missione francese che contemporaneamente si sta dirigendo a quella volta. In Malesia, la missione ha successo (e vengono anche regolati un po' di conti del passato: non dico di più), e Stephen ha anche il tempo di fare interessanti osservazioni naturalistiche. Giunto il momento di ripartire verso casa, la nave si incaglia su uno scoglio non segnato sulle mappe a poca distanza da un'isola disabitata: Fox, impaziente di consegnare l'accordo siglato, non aspetta le necessarie riparazioni e, visto che Batavia non è poi così lontana, decide di ripartire con parte dell'equipaggio su un'imbarcazione più piccola, mentre Jack, Stephen e il resto degli uomini rimangono sull'isola a riparare la Diane. Tutto a posto? No, perché un inaspettato e violentissimo tifone distrugge completamente la nave incagliata, oltre a far affondare presumibilmente l'imbarcazione su cui erano salpati Fox e gli altri sfortunati uomini. Quindi ora siamo bloccati per chissà quanto su quest'isola deserta.
Così si concludeva Rotta a Oriente, e così riparte questo Caccia notturna, puntata n. 14 della serie. È un libro che mi è piaciuto molto di più, specialmente, cosa che mi capita spesso, nelle parti più "terricole" (sull'isola deserta e soprattutto, negli ultimi capitoli del libro, ), anche se la bella "caccia notturna" sul mare del titolo domina la parte centrale del libro: una caccia anomala in cui la nuova nave di Jack, la Nutmeg, veste i panni della preda nei confronti della francese Cornélie, mentre in realtà la sta attirando in una trappola: la varietà di situazioni e di piani che O'Brian riesce a escogitare è sempre impressionante (tra parentesi, il titolo italiano fa pensare che sia questo l'episodio più importante del libro, ma in realtà non è così: d'altra parte quello originale è The Nutmeg of Consolation, che sarebbe appunto il nome della nuova nave di Jack dopo la perdita della Diane, ma riprenderlo fedelmente e intitolare il libro "La Noce moscata di consolazione" era effettivamente improponibile).
C'è comunque sempre qualche difettuccio che si ripresenta ormai da un po', e segnatamente che per buona parte degli ultimi libri Jack e Stephen conducono esistenze pressocché parallele (Jack impegnato nel governo della nave sul mare o in porto, Stephen in giro con il simpatico reverendo Martin a studiare la fauna e la flora locali) che si incontrano raramente: ci sono sì scene in cui i due si ritrovano nella cabina del comandante a chiacchierare, mangiare o suonare, ma sono brevi e non aggiungono molto, per il lettore, al loro rapporto di amicizia, il cuore della serie. Anzi, quasi quasi, più che queste scene che ormai seguono schemi già ben noti, stavolta mi sono piaciuti i rapidi sketch con i personaggi secondari dell'equipaggio, Killick su tutti e altri marinai di contorno.
Anche per questo ho apprezzato molto la parte finale del libro, che si svolge , dove O'Brian, oltre a dipingere un quadro vivido e brutale della realtà del luogo all'epoca (la sua fonte principale, come dice nella nota finale, è stato il bellissimo The Fatal Shore di Robert Hughes), introduce inaspettatamente un , butta lì numerosi accenni a un Jack piuttosto provato fisicamente dalle fatiche e dallo stress del viaggio che fanno un po' preoccupare me e Stephen, e infine svela un'importante novità nella vita privata di quest'ultimo di cui sicuramente si saprà di più nei prossimi libri.
Siamo a -6 libri dalla conclusione (perché mi sembra che il ventunesimo libro sia rimasto incompiuto) e, anche a giudicare dai titoli, ci dovremmo prima o poi riavvicinare a mari più conosciuti: lo spero perché secondo me la serie generalmente dà il suo meglio quando Jack e Stephen si trovano nel teatro principale del conflitto. Inoltre, dopo gli ultimi libri incentrati su Stephen, mi piacerebbe che il prossimo avesse più Jack come protagonista.
May 6, 2018
Like other novels in Patrick O’Brian’s Aubrey-Maturin series, the title of The Nutmeg of Consolation contains within it a dark joke. In the story, those words* are the name of a ship, and one of the many names of the Sultan who featured in this book’s precedent, The Thirteen Gun Salute. It’s a pleasing image, a phrase which feels obscure, ancient, nicely rounded — more so because it isn’t clear exactly what it means. Comfort and fortification in its most absolute form. It might have been an odd name for a ruler, but for a ship, or a home, or simply a hearth, it seems entirely fitting. But what is it we are trying to console ourselves from in this instance?
‘The world’ will do, perhaps. Maybe that’s for the best, because the world of this book is full of terrors. It begins as we left off in the previous novel, with Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin shipwrecked alongside the crew of the Diane somewhere in the South China sea. It is not long before they come under sustained assault from a local band of pirates; they only survive after a brief siege and a series of terribly bloody battles. It is a bleak and shocking way to open the novel; the violence is described with a cold remove, as though we were watching it through a telescope on a nearby hilltop. It’s visceral, but there is a strange silence to it.
Here is Aubrey considering the action afterwards:
‘To some degree it was the prodigious contrast between two modes of life: in violent hand-to-hand fighting there was no room for time, reflexion, enmity or even pain unless it was disabling; everything moved with extreme speed, cut and parry with a reflex as fast as a sword-thrust, eyes automatically keeping watch on three or four men within reach, arm lunging at the first hint of a lowered guard, a cry to warn a friend, a roar to put an enemy off his stroke; and all this in an extraordinarily vivid state of mind, a kind of fierce exaltation, an intense living in the most immediate present. Whereas now time came back with all its deadening weight – a living in relation to tomorrow, to next year, a flag promotion, children’s future – so did responsibility, the innumerable responsibilities belonging to the captain of a man-of-war. And decision: in battle, eye and sword-arm made the decisions with inconceivable rapidity; there was no leisure to brood over them, no leisure at all.’
The point about ‘two modes of life’ was also invoked at the start of The Thirteen Gun Salute, only there it was in the context of a sort of holiday. Here it is life and death by comparison. But again, the intent of both passages is the same: to make us wonder which of these lives is the real consolation for the other. Perhaps a state of war isn’t always so bad if the moments in between feel like ‘time…with all its deadening weight’.
There is precious little solace to be found in the world outside the crew. The news, arriving many months late from England, is that the bank in which Stephen has recently stashed his fortune might have gone under, as so many did in those days; he might therefore be broke. Of wives and children we hear next to nothing until a scrap of hope near the end. When our heroes strike out on a chase, they end up losing the advantage and become the ones pursued by the French. It is only a happy accident keeps them from being captured or killed.
I was very struck by this haunting anecdote, told by a guest at dinner and never really remarked upon or explained, in the middle of this book:
‘…three white bears were seen coming over the ice, a she-bear and her cubs…As she was fetching away the last piece the men shot the cubs dead and wounded her severely as she ran. She crawled as far as the cubs, still carrying the piece, tore it apart and laid some before each; and when she saw they could not eat she laid her paws first upon one, then upon the other and tried to raise them up. When she found she could not stir them, she went off; and when she had got at some distance, looked back and moaned; and since that did not induce them to come away, she returned, and smelling round them, began to lick their wounds. She went off a second time as before, and having crawled a few paces, looked again behind her, and for some time stood there moaning. But her cubs still not rising to follow her, she returned to them again, and with signs of inexpressible fondness went round one, and round the other, pawing them, and moaning. Finding at last that they were cold and lifeless, she lifted her head towards the men and growled; and several firing together they killed her too.’
This is as awful as anything else that men do to each other in this book; worse even in its brutality than the scene our sailors come upon later, on a remote island, where the entire population of natives has been killed by a smallpox epidemic. One of these scenes is pointlessly cruel, the other is merely sad.
O’Brian never quite seems to know how to handle a scene of human disaster, but as with all the nature sketches in these books, there’s a quality to the sequence above which is immediately affecting. It is equally hard to forget Stephen’s glimpse of a dugong and its calf, for example: ‘...at all times she showed the utmost solicitude for her child, occasionally going so far as to wash its face, which seemed a pointless task in so limpid a sea.’
Is this mere anthropomorphism? I think it’s more complicated than that. (‘Inexpressible fondness’ — who chose those words? Who thought the washing a pointless task? Surely not the man telling the story at the captain’s table.) For O’Brian, looking and thinking about nature becomes a way of thinking about ourselves: a coded discourse, like art or poetry or music, which exists beyond the crude manipulations of language. It is by no means unrelated that Stephen spends so much of this book thinking about children.
Eventually we come to Australia, where the Surprise puts in some time to restock and refit. They stay longer than expected, in fact, after Stephen gets into a disagreement with an Army officer (who he ends up cutting to ribbons with one of Jack’s swords). New South Wales is portrayed as a ghastly place, rendered almost surreal with despicable inhuman misery; sketchy and weird, like something out of Beckett or Kafka. At one point there is described ‘something like a business account, with amounts carried forward from one column to another, but the numbers were those of lashes, days of close confinement in the black hole, the weight of punishment-irons and their duration.’
It is a blasted plain, a rare example in these books of a place almost entirely without merit — except, of course, for the wonderful wildlife. Here the animals are certainly better than the people. The one memorable character who emerges from it is John Paulton, a rare local intellectual who strikes up something of a friendship with Maturin.
Paulton, it turns out, is a frustrated novelist, who retired to the wilderness thinking that the isolation would help him finish his great multi-volume opus. It is hard not to think of the author in relation — O’Brian himself, scribbling away in that idyllic village in the south of France — except the point that’s being made here is that what Paulton doesn’t appreciate is the virtues of society and conversation as an imaginative stimulus. Paulton isn’t a failure (though the brief excerpt we read from his novel is amusingly impenetrable) — he’s just misguided.
Here is Stephen, gently suggesting an alternative to his longing for the perfect ending:
‘There is another Frenchman whose name escapes me but who is even more to the point: La bêtise c’est de vouloir conclure. The conventional ending, with virtue rewarded and loose ends tied up is often sadly chilling; and its platitude and falsity tend to infect what has gone before, however excellent. Many books would be far better without their last chapter: or at least with no more than a brief, cool, unemotional statement of the outcome.’
This is another one of the author’s little games; that Frenchman was Flaubert, who wouldn’t even have been born yet in the 1812 in which Maturin is speaking. What he is saying is that it’s foolish to want to end. Taken literally, it’s a sly comment on the perpetual nature of these books. But it’s bittersweet, given that so much of what we’ve witnessed in this book is a show of misery. Perhaps the only consolation to be found is in sealing one’s self tight against the seas — like those timbers of the Nutmeg herself, after she was raised — and flushing the bilges, in spite of the rats — and carrying on.
‘The world’ will do, perhaps. Maybe that’s for the best, because the world of this book is full of terrors. It begins as we left off in the previous novel, with Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin shipwrecked alongside the crew of the Diane somewhere in the South China sea. It is not long before they come under sustained assault from a local band of pirates; they only survive after a brief siege and a series of terribly bloody battles. It is a bleak and shocking way to open the novel; the violence is described with a cold remove, as though we were watching it through a telescope on a nearby hilltop. It’s visceral, but there is a strange silence to it.
Here is Aubrey considering the action afterwards:
‘To some degree it was the prodigious contrast between two modes of life: in violent hand-to-hand fighting there was no room for time, reflexion, enmity or even pain unless it was disabling; everything moved with extreme speed, cut and parry with a reflex as fast as a sword-thrust, eyes automatically keeping watch on three or four men within reach, arm lunging at the first hint of a lowered guard, a cry to warn a friend, a roar to put an enemy off his stroke; and all this in an extraordinarily vivid state of mind, a kind of fierce exaltation, an intense living in the most immediate present. Whereas now time came back with all its deadening weight – a living in relation to tomorrow, to next year, a flag promotion, children’s future – so did responsibility, the innumerable responsibilities belonging to the captain of a man-of-war. And decision: in battle, eye and sword-arm made the decisions with inconceivable rapidity; there was no leisure to brood over them, no leisure at all.’
The point about ‘two modes of life’ was also invoked at the start of The Thirteen Gun Salute, only there it was in the context of a sort of holiday. Here it is life and death by comparison. But again, the intent of both passages is the same: to make us wonder which of these lives is the real consolation for the other. Perhaps a state of war isn’t always so bad if the moments in between feel like ‘time…with all its deadening weight’.
There is precious little solace to be found in the world outside the crew. The news, arriving many months late from England, is that the bank in which Stephen has recently stashed his fortune might have gone under, as so many did in those days; he might therefore be broke. Of wives and children we hear next to nothing until a scrap of hope near the end. When our heroes strike out on a chase, they end up losing the advantage and become the ones pursued by the French. It is only a happy accident keeps them from being captured or killed.
I was very struck by this haunting anecdote, told by a guest at dinner and never really remarked upon or explained, in the middle of this book:
‘…three white bears were seen coming over the ice, a she-bear and her cubs…As she was fetching away the last piece the men shot the cubs dead and wounded her severely as she ran. She crawled as far as the cubs, still carrying the piece, tore it apart and laid some before each; and when she saw they could not eat she laid her paws first upon one, then upon the other and tried to raise them up. When she found she could not stir them, she went off; and when she had got at some distance, looked back and moaned; and since that did not induce them to come away, she returned, and smelling round them, began to lick their wounds. She went off a second time as before, and having crawled a few paces, looked again behind her, and for some time stood there moaning. But her cubs still not rising to follow her, she returned to them again, and with signs of inexpressible fondness went round one, and round the other, pawing them, and moaning. Finding at last that they were cold and lifeless, she lifted her head towards the men and growled; and several firing together they killed her too.’
This is as awful as anything else that men do to each other in this book; worse even in its brutality than the scene our sailors come upon later, on a remote island, where the entire population of natives has been killed by a smallpox epidemic. One of these scenes is pointlessly cruel, the other is merely sad.
O’Brian never quite seems to know how to handle a scene of human disaster, but as with all the nature sketches in these books, there’s a quality to the sequence above which is immediately affecting. It is equally hard to forget Stephen’s glimpse of a dugong and its calf, for example: ‘...at all times she showed the utmost solicitude for her child, occasionally going so far as to wash its face, which seemed a pointless task in so limpid a sea.’
Is this mere anthropomorphism? I think it’s more complicated than that. (‘Inexpressible fondness’ — who chose those words? Who thought the washing a pointless task? Surely not the man telling the story at the captain’s table.) For O’Brian, looking and thinking about nature becomes a way of thinking about ourselves: a coded discourse, like art or poetry or music, which exists beyond the crude manipulations of language. It is by no means unrelated that Stephen spends so much of this book thinking about children.
Eventually we come to Australia, where the Surprise puts in some time to restock and refit. They stay longer than expected, in fact, after Stephen gets into a disagreement with an Army officer (who he ends up cutting to ribbons with one of Jack’s swords). New South Wales is portrayed as a ghastly place, rendered almost surreal with despicable inhuman misery; sketchy and weird, like something out of Beckett or Kafka. At one point there is described ‘something like a business account, with amounts carried forward from one column to another, but the numbers were those of lashes, days of close confinement in the black hole, the weight of punishment-irons and their duration.’
It is a blasted plain, a rare example in these books of a place almost entirely without merit — except, of course, for the wonderful wildlife. Here the animals are certainly better than the people. The one memorable character who emerges from it is John Paulton, a rare local intellectual who strikes up something of a friendship with Maturin.
Paulton, it turns out, is a frustrated novelist, who retired to the wilderness thinking that the isolation would help him finish his great multi-volume opus. It is hard not to think of the author in relation — O’Brian himself, scribbling away in that idyllic village in the south of France — except the point that’s being made here is that what Paulton doesn’t appreciate is the virtues of society and conversation as an imaginative stimulus. Paulton isn’t a failure (though the brief excerpt we read from his novel is amusingly impenetrable) — he’s just misguided.
Here is Stephen, gently suggesting an alternative to his longing for the perfect ending:
‘There is another Frenchman whose name escapes me but who is even more to the point: La bêtise c’est de vouloir conclure. The conventional ending, with virtue rewarded and loose ends tied up is often sadly chilling; and its platitude and falsity tend to infect what has gone before, however excellent. Many books would be far better without their last chapter: or at least with no more than a brief, cool, unemotional statement of the outcome.’
This is another one of the author’s little games; that Frenchman was Flaubert, who wouldn’t even have been born yet in the 1812 in which Maturin is speaking. What he is saying is that it’s foolish to want to end. Taken literally, it’s a sly comment on the perpetual nature of these books. But it’s bittersweet, given that so much of what we’ve witnessed in this book is a show of misery. Perhaps the only consolation to be found is in sealing one’s self tight against the seas — like those timbers of the Nutmeg herself, after she was raised — and flushing the bilges, in spite of the rats — and carrying on.
August 5, 2023
Review later. But probably the best non-battle chase sequence he's done so far.
March 12, 2011
This is honest-to-God one of my favorite authors/series. I love this books. They are tremendously well researched. It's ridiculous to compare these to any other "historical fiction" that I am aware of. You would think they had been written when the events within them actually occurred.
Nutmeg of Consolation has Aubrey and Maturin recovering from a shipwreck on an island. They manage to get off the island with the help of a passing ship that came to collect birds nests which are used for "bird's nest soup". Hah. They manage to return to Batavia, modern-day Jakarta, and are given another ship by the governor. They then set off to intercept a French vessel that they encountered in a previous book. The chase is a good one, as they usually are, and after they successfully sink it, they continue on to New South Wales, or Botany Bay, which is Australia. The description of Australia as a penal colony, the politics that went on there, and the treatment of the prisioners is very interesting. Maturin has an unfortunate encounter with a platypus and the book ends on this strange incident, something that Patrick O'Brian has done on more than one occasion.
But it's never the big plot items that I enjoy the most about these books. It's rather the small details that are always included about life on a British ship at this time, the interactions between the characters, the friendship between Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin, the extremely dry wit, and dailly life they live. I cannot recommend this more to friends, thoughg I admit they are probably not for everyone, but then rarely is there a book that is.
Nutmeg of Consolation has Aubrey and Maturin recovering from a shipwreck on an island. They manage to get off the island with the help of a passing ship that came to collect birds nests which are used for "bird's nest soup". Hah. They manage to return to Batavia, modern-day Jakarta, and are given another ship by the governor. They then set off to intercept a French vessel that they encountered in a previous book. The chase is a good one, as they usually are, and after they successfully sink it, they continue on to New South Wales, or Botany Bay, which is Australia. The description of Australia as a penal colony, the politics that went on there, and the treatment of the prisioners is very interesting. Maturin has an unfortunate encounter with a platypus and the book ends on this strange incident, something that Patrick O'Brian has done on more than one occasion.
But it's never the big plot items that I enjoy the most about these books. It's rather the small details that are always included about life on a British ship at this time, the interactions between the characters, the friendship between Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin, the extremely dry wit, and dailly life they live. I cannot recommend this more to friends, thoughg I admit they are probably not for everyone, but then rarely is there a book that is.
July 2, 2010
This, the 14th novel in the British naval historical fiction series telling the stories of captain Jack Aubrey and physician/spy Stephen Maturin, may be my favorite so far in this engaging, erudite, albeit long series. I've given it 5 stars and as I think back on how deeply I've enjoyed this whole series, I am considering going back to my other reviews and changing them all from 4 to 5 stars. Anyway, this installment is chock-full of fabulousness-- shipwreck on a desert island, Malay pirates, bird's nest soup, enemy French warships, Australia. (Australia, by the way, comes off as a truly miserable place at this period in its history, with its population of prisoners and ill-treated Aboriginal people.)
And whatever you do, beware the platypus.
And whatever you do, beware the platypus.
September 4, 2022
Patrick O'Brian continues as excellently as always. This story doesn't really have a dramatic arc of any sort and is simply a continuation of the voyage that started in the previous novel. But that does not mean that important issues are not handled: Captain Aubrey is shown to suffer from a condition that changes his behavior while Maturin struggles with his sense of responsibility for an old friend who is now suffering as a convict in Australia. The harshness of life and the evilness of men in a land that serves mostly as prison to westerners is very well described, down to the corruption of the aboriginals who show off their skills with boomerangs for shots of rum and drink themselves to death.
In short, another gem from the master of (historical) fiction!
In short, another gem from the master of (historical) fiction!
January 22, 2015
Stephen's experience is life in a nutshell. You have a ship. Your ship is gone. You have money. Your money is gone. You have shipmates. Your shipmates have been killed. You have a nice supply of coca leaves. Then you don't. But you find a new ship. You make more money. You get new shipmates. So many major life changes in just a few short weeks.
What remains constant: Friendship. Devotion to his professional goals. The mission he has sworn to carry out. (Marriage isn't included in this list, because although Stephen is still married, his relationship with his wife has never been exactly stable.)
What remains constant: Friendship. Devotion to his professional goals. The mission he has sworn to carry out. (Marriage isn't included in this list, because although Stephen is still married, his relationship with his wife has never been exactly stable.)
May 19, 2008
Every one of my Patrick O'Brian reviews are the same: I love these books! I think the best bit of this one is them being shipwrecked (again!) and having to find a way out of it. This kind of thing really makes you realize how little ability modern people have with their hands. I know that *I* couldn't build a ship from scratch using the materials from a wrecked one plus whatever was available on a desert island. How about you?
I'll be sad when I come to the end of the series. But wait, that means I can start again from the beginning right?
I'll be sad when I come to the end of the series. But wait, that means I can start again from the beginning right?
September 20, 2023
3.5 because while P’OB’s prose is as lovely and endlessly engaging as always, this felt v much like a connecting novel between other (more interesting) parts of the story. some great moments though (cocaine rat, the lesser known prequel to cocaine bear) and we love a platypus.
plus this is the first one i’ve listened to on audio and the narration was great. his killick had me in tears
plus this is the first one i’ve listened to on audio and the narration was great. his killick had me in tears
December 27, 2023
A tremendously enjoyable work. There are the usual O’Brian highlights—a near-run chase over hundreds of sea miles, the humor and turns of phrase of Jack Aubrey, and the joy of two close friends at sea, both of whom very much at home with each other. Reading a description of a new frigate being fitted out was itself also interesting.
August 2, 2025
Kanskje en av de beste så langt. Aubrey og Maturin har ærend i en australsk straffekoloni, og skildringen av denne samt diskusjonene rundt lov og straff er veldig veldig gode.
September 17, 2014
As with all the novels in this series (which might be considered one long novel), I loved this book. All the elements of a great novel are here, but there is one ingredient in the Aubrey/Maturin novels that is missing from so many other great works: a deeply developed, realistically represented, quirky friendship between two men. The friendship between Jack and Stephen makes all the other male friendships I can think of in famous literature seem caricatured or shallow or like a device through which the author is able to achieve something (like showcasing the brilliance of one character through the foil of the other - think Sherlock Holmes or even Father Brown). The only other friendship I can think of off hand that at times comes close to this one is that of Frodo and Sam. These are not novels of naval sea action or espionage or life in the era of the Napoleonic Wars or of natural history exploration. These stories contain all these elements. However, to their core, these are stories of a friendship.
For me, reading an Aubrey/Maturin novel is like spending time with old familiar friends. They have their quirks but they only serve to endear, not annoy. The stories in the series are not completely evenly told. The earlier books have more of the action and commentary happening through periodic journal entries or letters home written by Jack or Stephen. The earlier books also seem to skip longer periods of time whereas the later ones tend more toward continuous narrative with each chapter and even each book picking up right where the last one left off. I imagine this is likely because O'Brian started his story in the midst of the Napoleonic Wars rather than near the beginning and realized he only had so much time to play with. However, I still have 2 complete and one partial novel left so I may yet be proved wrong.
Can't recommend this series enough.
For me, reading an Aubrey/Maturin novel is like spending time with old familiar friends. They have their quirks but they only serve to endear, not annoy. The stories in the series are not completely evenly told. The earlier books have more of the action and commentary happening through periodic journal entries or letters home written by Jack or Stephen. The earlier books also seem to skip longer periods of time whereas the later ones tend more toward continuous narrative with each chapter and even each book picking up right where the last one left off. I imagine this is likely because O'Brian started his story in the midst of the Napoleonic Wars rather than near the beginning and realized he only had so much time to play with. However, I still have 2 complete and one partial novel left so I may yet be proved wrong.
Can't recommend this series enough.
August 5, 2018
This is now my third time reading through this brilliant series and I am reminded again how beautifully written and how wonderfully, addictively enjoyable they are.
The sublimely titled Nutmeg Of Consolation finds Jack and his wrecked and battered crew still in the Far East, but restored to a ship and heading for their rendezvous with the Surprise and thence to the penal colonies of New South Wales to refit. There is plenty of seagoing action this time, plus a superb picture of the true horror of the penal colonies and plenty of life ashore for Steven as a naturalist. It’s another superbly constructed, engrossing instalment with a couple more of O’Brian’s quiet but deeply touching moments, too.
Patrick O'Brian is steeped in the period of the early 19th Century and his knowledge of the language, manners, politics, social mores and naval matters of the time is deep and wide. Combined with a magnificent gift for both prose and storytelling, it makes something very special indeed. The books are so perfectly paced, with some calmer, quieter but still engrossing passages and some quite thrilling action sequences. O'Brian's handling of language is masterly, with the dialogue being especially brilliant, but also things like the way his sentences become shorter and more staccato in the action passages, making them heart-poundingly exciting. There are also laugh-out-loud moments and an overall sense of sheer involvement and pleasure in reading.
I cannot recommend these books too highly. They are that rare thing; fine literature which are also books which I can't wait to read more of. Wonderful stuff.
The sublimely titled Nutmeg Of Consolation finds Jack and his wrecked and battered crew still in the Far East, but restored to a ship and heading for their rendezvous with the Surprise and thence to the penal colonies of New South Wales to refit. There is plenty of seagoing action this time, plus a superb picture of the true horror of the penal colonies and plenty of life ashore for Steven as a naturalist. It’s another superbly constructed, engrossing instalment with a couple more of O’Brian’s quiet but deeply touching moments, too.
Patrick O'Brian is steeped in the period of the early 19th Century and his knowledge of the language, manners, politics, social mores and naval matters of the time is deep and wide. Combined with a magnificent gift for both prose and storytelling, it makes something very special indeed. The books are so perfectly paced, with some calmer, quieter but still engrossing passages and some quite thrilling action sequences. O'Brian's handling of language is masterly, with the dialogue being especially brilliant, but also things like the way his sentences become shorter and more staccato in the action passages, making them heart-poundingly exciting. There are also laugh-out-loud moments and an overall sense of sheer involvement and pleasure in reading.
I cannot recommend these books too highly. They are that rare thing; fine literature which are also books which I can't wait to read more of. Wonderful stuff.
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