Ramage

Excellent series, sometimes based upon actual events. Always a good story with interesting characters, puzzling quandaries, and sometimes quirky solutions. Age of sail tyros should read early in their literary questing for his knowledge and insights into fighting, sailing, and British Navy life during these quite fascinating times. Many set in the Caribbean where Pope lived for most of his writing career enabling him to provide very helpful maps, not often found in fiction, for his scenarios.

This book introduces many of the characters that sustain through the series. Because the books are not always available in their historic sequence; Pope usually provides some quick background information early in each book.

"Ramage" is the first in a series of sea novels. The story opens up with a sea battle and our ship sinking. Our hero becomes the captain of a sinking ship and the start of his troubles. Ramage is likable, perhaps too much so with the crew. I found some parts boring, too much description about putting up sails. Another part that annoyed me was his reaction to the lady in the story. A bit overdone. He sounded like a wide eyed schoolboy. I'm hoping it doesn't take him too long to become a adult.

I read this book a while ago and cannot believe I never added it to my library.

Ramage is a lord and his father is a disgraced naval officer but not by deed. Ramage is just starting his career in the Navy. This book starts when he is a junior officer on a ship between Corsica and Italy and is in the fight for its life... and losing. He is the only officer alive and must make a decision surrender or retreat and save some of the men. Both options are bad in the view of the British Navy but he has no choice.

He looks at the orders for the ship and finds that its secret mission is to rescue Italian aristocrats. It is the only way he can save himself from being torn apart in a court marshal.

It is a great adventure with many great scenes and show more the decriptions are first rate.

I look forward to reading more of this series show less

O destino faz com que o tenente Nicholas Ramage assuma o comando da fragata inglesa Sibella, em meio ao fogo cerrado dos inimigos franceses. O navio está prestes a ir a pique, mas a rendição não entra nos planos do oficial. Ramage faz uma manobra que permite salvar boa parte da tripulação da fragata e parte para nova missão: resgatar, em terra, um grupo de aristocratas franceses contrários á política de Napoleão. Algo inesperado acontece: a fuga pela praia, um dos aristocratas, o conde Pitti, é dado como morto e Rmage decide zarpar sem ele, levando apenas o conde Pisano e sua prima, a marquesa di Volterra. Tentando ocultar sua própria covardia, Pisano acusa Ramage de covardia e incompetência, por ter deixado, ainda com show more vida, o conde Pitti na praia. A acusação leva Ramage á Corte Marcial, mas o oficial ao qual ele es´ta subordinado, o almirante Nelson, continua confiando nele e resolve lhe dar nova chance. Ramage é enrão enviado para uma missão ainda mais perigosa e demonstra grande bravura. show less

Lt. Lord Nicholas Ramage begins his navy career with enemies, the men who hounded his father out of the service on false charges of cowardice. As a junior lieutenant he has kept a low profile, until the frigate he serves on is attacked by a French ship and he is the only surviving officer. The ship cannot be saved, but he gets the able-bodied sailors off in the boats and proceeds to carry out orders to rescue anti-Napoleonic Italians. He falls in love with the young Viscountess but alienates her cousin. Facing a court martial for the loss of his ship he must hope that the truth comes out despite the machinations of superior officers. Fans of the naval genre will be amused by references to that Hornblower chap.

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I love this genre. Dudley Pope gets props for realizing that some of his readers may be lubbers, so some sailing terms are explained or described. For example, after all my reading in this genre--Hornblower, Bolitho, Jack Aubrey--I still didn't know what it meant to "heave to," although I had worked out that it is a way of stopping the ship without dropping anchor. Pope explains it nicely. Well done.

3547. Ramage A Novel, by Dudley Pope (read 23 Feb 2002) Since I read and enjoyed five great works of non-fiction by Dudley Pope (the greatest of the five, I thought, being At Twelve Mr. Byng Was Shot, which I read 21 Mar 1982 and found especially memorable), I thought I would read one of his works of fiction, telling of a smart officer in the English navy in Napoleon's time. The book has a lot of nautical and sailing technical talk which interested me not at all, but the story is OK. I doubt I'll read more in the series, which I guess extends over the whole Napoleonic era.