Ramage & the Guillotine (The Lord Ramage Novels) [Paperback]

Dudley Pope (Author)

Book Description

Series: The Lord Ramage Novels | Publication Date: October 1, 2000

Across the English Channel, Napoleon has massed a great invasion flotilla. English forces, under Lord Nelson, are all but paralyzed—not knowing the size, strength, or time of the foreign onslaught. In a daring spy scheme to protect British shores, Ramage is chosen to plumb the secrets of the French, and the penalty for failure is the guillotine.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Not even C. S. Forester knows more about the routine and battle procedures of the British Navy in the days of Nelson." -- The New York Times

"Ramage is a blazing, individual character in his own right. . . his latest adventure is one of the best." -- Evening News

"The first and still favourite rival to Hornblower." -- Daily Mirror

About the Author

Dudley Pope, a naval defense correspondent of the London Evening News, progressed to writing carefully researched naval history. C.S. Forester urged Pope to try his hand at fiction and saw the younger writer as his literary heir. Pope began what was to become an impressive series with Ramage (1965) and, over the next 24 years, produced 17 more novels tracing Lord Ramage's career. Pope died in 1997.

Product Details

• Paperback: 320 pages
• Publisher: McBooks Press (October 1, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0935526811
• ISBN-13: 978-0935526813
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.5 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #575,487 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Ramage the Spy, August 11, 2001

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tertius3 (MI United States) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Ramage & the Guillotine (The Lord Ramage Novels) (Paperback)

In which Lt. Ramage speaks with Lord Nelson and smugglers alike, takes passage for "Boney's" France, is astounded and becomes a shipwright, employs a thief, speaks to a policman of knives and sealing wax, and joins the French army! One suspects that Liberty - Equality - Fraternity meant only the liberty to reduce your brother citizens into equal misery. Of course, the British Navy's blockade also had something to do with the desperate state of the French economy revealed here (and rarely depicted in other seafaring series).

If you like stories of the Napoleonic era you'll enjoy this close up view of the French Terror into which idealists descended, but if your desire is only battle at sea this volume will disappoint. As far as I know this is the only nautical novel that brings its naval hero so far and long into enemy France (perhaps Pope is fulfilling the promise of C.S. Forester's "Hornblower During The Crisis" left unfinished by Forester's death before HH gets ashore).

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A secret mission to France, May 19, 2001

By 

Fred Camfield (Vicksburg, MS USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Ramage & the Guillotine (The Lord Ramage Novels) (Paperback)

"If you wake at midnight, and hear a horse's feet, don't go drawing back the blind, or looking in the street. Them that asks no questions isn't told a lie. Watch the wall, my darling, while the Gentlemen go by!" (from Rudyard Kipling's "A Smuggler's Song"). The smuggling trade plays a major part in this novel - it is tolerated to a point because it supplies certain luxuries and is a means of handling agents and intelligence during wartime. Like his other novels, Pope relies on the reader's knowledge of history to determine the time setting. The novel seems to be between 1801 and 1805, as it is after the first Battle of Copenhagen and, as Admiral Lord Nelson is still alive, the story must be before 1805. A good guess might place the novel in the later part of 1801. That leaves a major time gap between the end of the last novel in the series and the beginning of this novel. Later novels in the series jump back to fill in spaces left blank by earlier novels, so it is difficult for the reader to get the novels in a proper chronological sequence.

The novel spans a period of two to three weeks. The story tends to go into fine detail and, at a couple of points, I found myself skimming forward. Actual naval action is limited. However, there is considerable detail on the smuggling operations between France and England (the smugglers' primary loyalty is to money), and on the so-called "justice system" of revolutionary France (which kept the guillotine busy).

Ramage is given a special mission inside France as a spy to obtain vital information. The Royal Navy was willing to tolerate unusual methods and breaches of the law as long as it produced results. The blame would be on Ramage if he failed.

Overall, the story is an interesting tale of intrigue. Actual naval action is limited.

11 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Ramage (and Pope) are out of their element, December 31, 2001

By 

Roger Lee - See all my reviews

This review is from: Ramage & the Guillotine (The Lord Ramage Novels) (Paperback)

This is easily the weakest installment in this series so far. While it is certainly readable, it is seriously flawed. First, there is almost no action at sea, which is the primary reason I read these books. Pope was very good at describing action at sea but, in general, his skills as a writer were only average. The plot is very thin, and the book really drags in the middle. The action picks up some at the end, but not enough to be really satisfying. The main problem with this book is that it just doesn't generate much suspense. Also, Ramage himself does very little in this book; he is just along for the ride as the smugglers and his subordinates do almost all the work. This book is not a total loss, however. I thought the details of the smuggling trade were interesting, and the picture Pope paints of France during the Napoleonic War is very vivid and interesting. Pope portrays France as a country tearing itself apart even as its Grand Army was conquering most of Europe. The government would execute a citizen simply because someone accused him or her of being a Royalist. This, of course, was a good way for a person to get rid of a personal enemy or business rival. It reminded me of what conditions must have been like in Stalinist Russia, where a paranoid government had its agents keeping a close watch on everyone. So, overall, it's not a terrible book, but I look forward to Ramage getting back to sea in the next installment.