The Nutmeg of Consolation

Patrick O'Brian is regarded by many as the greatest historical novelist writing in English. In THE NUTMEG OF CONSOLATION, Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin are 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 on a chase in fiercely tidal waters and then embroiled in much more insidious conflicts on the terrifying penal settlements of New South Wales. It is one of O'Brian's most accomplished and gripping books. "O'Brian's narrative pace is always gripping: it shifts its speed and provides endless varying shocks and surprises - comic, grim, farcical and tragic." A. S. Byatt, EVENING TIMES