Customer Reviews

Ramage and the Rebels

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

In #9 Capt. Ramage continues his Caribbean cruising, now out of the Jamaica Station under a purely political Admiral (i.e., one with no practical experience or understanding). This is the first book in several with any gory slaughter in it, here either privateers' victims or a long, running fight ashore. By planning--glimpses of which we get to see and guess their purpose--and always by surprise, Ramage avoids taking losses and instead metes them out to his enemies. Still, Ramage manages several more of his special bloodless surprise conquests that earn him citations in the Naval Gazette. As his conquest of another beautiful foreign lady who falls within eyeshot would not! The theme of this novel is honour, what it is, who has it, and what it requires. We get to see Ramage as a diplomat on his own--a role not previously seen even when he was "Governor" in Book 4. Plain to see is the difference between honorable and dishonorable conduct as the situations between the Dutch, British, and French--and various privateers or rebels--suddenly alter, and then shift again. The key is that governments are never honorable and steadfast, only some of their "regretful" citizens. Curiously, the one map doesn't name the islands featured here, the Dutch Aruba and Curacao, leaving readers as blind as if we were chartless in shoal water! The book's wrap-around cover art is different from that shown above on amazon.com (= picture from #8), but no more sensical (a frigate in pursuit with no headsails set?). As ever, Dudley Pope is precise and accurate in his descriptions, although it certainly helps in following the ship manuevers if you know the difference between starboard and port tacks and remember where Pope says the wind is from.

This novel in the Ramage series provides another twist to the exploits of the good Captain. While sent to patrol and seek out pirates and privateers in the souhern carribean, he captures a French frigate and discovers a tempting opportuntity
on the Dutch island of Curacao. Finding the island on the verge of anarachy, threatened by angry privateers and rebellious locals, he accepts the surrender of the island so that he may try to save it from disaster. The story moves quickly and maintains interest right through the treacherous conclusion. One of the better novels in this series.

This novel, written as No. 9 in the series, is based on historical events occurring in 1800. It follows No. 6 (Ramage & the Guillotine) which seemed to be set in 1801, and is one of the sequels to No. 7 (Ramage's Diamond) which seems to be set historically in 1804. Dudley Pope seemed to have a major problem setting his later novels in proper historical order. Readers continuing the series should be aware of that problem. The novels must be read in numerical order for development of Ramage's career, love life, etc., but after No. 7 they seem to drop back to circa 1799 and then progress forward again to 1804. Among other things, the series puts the frigate Calypso in continuous service with the same crew from circa 1799 to 1805. The frigate and crew become caught in a time warp. The novels are OK to read in numerical order if one ignores the technical and historical glitches.

The present novel has an interesting plot, starting with discovery of French brandy in the ship's water casks. Ramage is sent off to deal with privateers operating out of the Dutch island of Curacao. As in other novels in the series, Ramage replaces a real life Royal Navy captain, in this case the captain of the frigate Néréide. He continues his extraordinary exploits, destroying enemy frigates, capturing privateers and, in fact, capturing an island. There is enough action thrown in to keep the novel interesting, but I sometimes wish for a more believable character. In contrast, Richard Woodman's novels in the Nathaniel Drinkwater series are diligent in correctly following historical events (Woodman provides dates on his chapter headings), and Drinkwater is a much more believable hero.

Like many in this first-rate series of sea stories set in the Napoleonic wars, the plot this time is based on a real incident: The surrender of the Dutch colony of Curaçao in 1800 to a Royal Navy frigate -- which puts it slightly out of historical sequence with the rest of the series, but most readers probably won't notice or care. The Netherlands had been invaded and occupied by revolutionary France, which renamed it the Batavian Republic, and the island's reluctant governor had managed to avoid the guillotine and keep his job -- though he was continually in danger from the young Jacobins among his own people. More than that, Curaçao had become the favored harbor and marketplace for French privateers in the Caribbean, which put even more pressure on the local Dutch. Ramage, meanwhile, has a new admiral, a thoroughly venal character who doesn't care how many officers and men he loses, as long as they bring in the prize money (of which the commander in chief gets one-eighth) so he can bribe his way into the peerage. Ramage has orders to capture those privateers; not to sink them, but to bring them back for sale. And he and his ship's company are strongly motivated by their discovery of an atrocity perpetrated by a privateering schooner. Ramage is startled to be asked to negotiate the island's surrender -- which he can't do, legally, but he can "capture" the island -- and then discovers that if he wants to keep Britain's new prize he's going to have to deal with the privateers and local revolutionaries, who are on the point of destroying the island. Ramage is a sailor, not a soldier, but with a little help by his Marine lieutenant, he manages, though the action bogs down a bit and impatiently skips over some things. (And while there's a lot of good stuff here, as always, I think Pope misses a couple of good bets. For instance, I would have had the captured brother of the main villain turn out to be the Bad Guy himself, who is lying his head off.)

I finished the first book of the series, Ramage, and I strongly recommend it to those who enjoy nautical books that depict the seafaring adventures and striking battles and strategies of the British Navy during the wars with France and Spain. It isn't quite up to the Patrick O'Brian quality, but is very close. Dudley Pope shows that with time and experience, he will be right up there with the best. I strongly recommend this book to anyone who enjoys historical fiction, romance and suspense.

The action starts with Ramage and crew coming across a ship whose crew and passengers have been murdered. Naturally, Ramage and the boys must find the culprits. Well, nothing happens with respect to this plot for a LONG time--it's almost forgotten. As a matter of fact, nothing really happens and the book drags for a while. At the end, the action and suspense pick up again, making this a fun book to read. But to get to the good stuff, the reader's got to pay his dues.