The Far Side of the World (Vol. Book 10) (Aubrey/Maturin Novels)

This book partially inspired the Master and Commander movie. Maybe not the best of the Aubrey/Maturin series, it recommends anyway itself for the usual masterly O'Brian's description of day by day life on a British frigate in the Napoleonic age. Worth the money for O'Brian's fans (like myself).

This Kindle book did not arrive. Please try again!!!!
Having been engrossed by eight of Patrick O'Brian,s Aubrey/Maturin series of wonderful nautical tales, I am grossly disappointed at the failure of this book to successfully arrive by Kindle. It also seems impossible to make satisfactory contact with the store Kindle so that you/they can rectify this problem.

Some reviews have noted the authors own sense that this is not his strongest work. However, weak O'Brian is still full of roaring good adventures. This is still a page turning book and it ends with a great flourish. While the basic theme of the book is a simple one: find the American ship, harass or sink and protect British whaling ships. On the way through this campaign Captain Jack Aubrey must contend with many challenges. There is the unfortunate story of Hollom and his foolish perambulations with the gunners wife. That they both meet a tragic end and that the gunner himself does evil upon himself is not given as much plot expansion as it could have. But, I don't fault the author as there were many other challenges lying in wait.

None of them was more harrowing than the passage under the foot of South America. Known to have the most destructive and formidable storms (other than hurricanes) the route from the Atlantic to the Pacific is very dangerous even in present days. The manner in which the Surprise and its terrified crew were tossed about as it made its way through the storms was superbly written. Poor Dr. Maturin is once again pitted against his greatest enemy: his footing on board boats. Throughout all the books, running almost like a continuous joke, is the fact that the Doctor often slips and falls either on board a ship or when trying to pass between ships. In this book not only does he fall out of a window with his best friend diving in to save him, again, this begins a long period in which the reader really does wonder if they are going to drown alone as their ship sails away, unable to hear their cries? This chapter of the book is well developed and leads to an interesting, even if somewhat improbable completion. Our heroes are saved of course but along the way it is nip and tuck and not a sure thing. This is how good dramatic tension is supposed to work. Then just when you figured that the Doctor had had enough of almost drowning from falling into the water, he is tossed through the air in the midst of a hurricane and smashes his head, leading to him falling into a coma. Again, we are not certain how this is going to resolve itself. The resolution is both funny and a bit anti-climactic.

Finally, in the last section of the book, with the Captain, the Doctor and a small crew somewhat shipwrecked on a volcanic island, only to find that their nemesis, the American crew of the Norfolk was on the island, with their ship completely torn to pieces as a result of the massive hurricane that the Surprise managed to sail through. Tensions rise and rise and once again it is the enterprising, keen and experienced eye of Captain Aubrey who knew when to take action and let nothing get in the way of getting it done. Though it was to be for naught, his captaining strengths were in full form. The protagonists are rescued, at the last moment and the whole affair is brought to a very satisfying end. The curtain falls and we have been well entertained.

What I find in one of O'Brian's great skills as a writer is his sense of timing. I have rarely encountered an author who writes as if he has a musical score in mind. The tempo, sometimes shifting into the natural cadence of interrupted speech, reminds us that this is the way people really do speak: we are interrupted from talking to someone and often we react in mid sentence with a heightened sense of annoyance. O'Brian captures these cadences with perfection. As a musician myself I am keenly aware that timing, meter and of course the themes being spun are all that keep a reader fixed. O'Brian is such a master at his craft that before you know it you have read 200 pages in a few days time. Chapters end with certainty as if a movement of a symphony had been resolved. We cannot wait to go on and our eyes are already scanning the next chapter. We are hooked, we are entranced, we are seduced. After you have read many of these novels you get to anticipating what the main characters will do. We laugh out loud when Killick's antics and manners are brought out. We love the repartee between Jack and Stephen. We can almost hear their amateur music making as the ship sails along. We can almost smell the toasted cheese served up in the evenings.

It is true that these books are pearls on a long chain. Taken together I quite agree with other comments: these are the very best historical novels, especially naval stories. Direct comparisons between this book and the Peter Weir film are going to put your nose out of joint. The film used material from at least 5 books and that is the way the script was created. Enjoy this book (and the film) for what they are. Wonderful literature, nuanced, hilarious, frightful, storm tossed, harrowing, trying and ever full of adventure. I love them all.

Given the existence of the movie MASTER AND COMMANDER: THE FAR SIDE OF THE WORLD, something has to be said initially about that. I would very strongly recommend anyone who has seen the movie and wants to read the novel to resist the temptation to do so. Mainly this is because it is the tenth novel in a series, and the author assumes that you have read the previous nine. If you pick this up and attempt to read it without having read the others, you will be utterly at sea (pun intended). I also do not recommend this novel to viewers of the movie (who don't intend to read the other novels first) because the novel and the movie bear very little resemblence to one another. There is, in fact, almost nothing in common between the two except for the two main characters, the fact that the H.M.S. Surprise is chasing another ship (an American ship rather than French as in the movie, presumably so as not to alienate American movie goers), they encounter the Gallapagos Islands, and they end up in the Pacific. In other words, there is only the most superficial resemblence between the novel and the movie.

For readers of the series, this is one of the stronger additions to the sequence. Instead of taking the Surprise back to England where she is to be sold or perhaps broken up, Jack is summoned to go out in search of the U.S.S. Norfolk, an American ship sent out to harrass British whaling ships in the Pacific. Although things go well at first, it turns out to be an almost doomed voyage, with one catastrophe after another taking place. None of the misfortunes dooms the mission, but neither do they allow anything to go smoothly. The only thing that saves the mission is that the Norfolk ends up having even less luck than the Surprise.

The key to Patrick O'Brians series is not to focus too very much on any one novel. There is truly a sense in which all the novels together form a single saga. Unlike other series, no single book stands very well alone. In fact, each novel functioned more like a chapter in a very long book than an independent novel. For the reader who plows through all of the novels, this can be immensely satisfying, like reading the longest novel ever written. I'm a little surprised that the publishers didn't contest O'Brian's strategy (or perhaps they did but he successfully resisted). Most publishers prefer series that can be entered at any point in the sequence, but with the Aubrey-Maturin books you need to start at the beginning or not at all.

While I do not recommend neophytes beginning with this series, I do heartily commend the whole group of books. This is not merely the finest set of historical novels ever written, as has often been noted by literary critics and reviewers: it is arguably the finest long series of novels of any genre of the past hundred years. It has the potential to appeal to a remarkable range of people, whether fans of great literature, those engaged in sailing, those who enjoy first rate historical fiction, or those who like sea faring adventure. It is a sequence that can truly be many things to many people, and yet manage to satisfy all.

I am working through Patrick O'Brian's famed Aubrey-Maturin series in order, and am both proud and sad to say that I've reached the midway point with Book 10, "The Far Side of the World." But it is without reservation that I say that this is my favorite novel in the series so far.

Part of that enjoyment stems directly from my enjoyment of first nine books in this series - this is not an example of one sterling novel in a series of sub-par efforts. Rather, I appreciate "Far Side" for the new directions where O'Brian is willing to take the characters he has established so well.

The first nine novels can be safely broken down into "Aubrey novels" or "Maturin novels". The "Aubrey novels" have plots that follow the personality of Captain "Lucky Jack" Aubrey - they are action packed, with taut sea-chases and horrific broadsides. "Master & Commander" and "The Mauritius Command" fall into that category. The "Maturin novels," on the other hand, focus their plots on Dr. Stephen Maturin and his spy-games. "The Surgeon's Mate" is one of these novels. While all the novels feature the classic O'Brian love of language, their plots tended to focus on one over the other.

"Far Side" takes a new tack, as in this novel Aubrey is charged with tracking down an American frigate, the "Norfolk," that is harrassing British whalers in the Pacific. So there is lots of sailing - they have to get to the Far Side of the World, after all. O'Brian reveals himself as a travel writer of surpassing skill as he describes the wild sights that enchant the naturalist Maturin, including the Galapagos Islands. For the nature-lovers in O'Brian's cast of characters, the thought of spying a new type of beetle is just as romantic a notion as encountering a pod of eighty-ton sperm whales.

In addition to some spectacular travel writing, O'Brian musters up fights, murder, mayhem, shipwrecks, and even the sub-plot of Aubrey and Maturin winding up lost at sea, only to be rescued by seafaring Polynesian/the storeians. The novel twists and turns, but always seems both plausible and restrained. Look for a lot of humor and touch-and-go action in this novel, and the novel's conclusion is highly satisfying and yet leaves one panting for Book 11, "The Reverse of the Medal."

Be warned - despite its title, this is not the sole O'Brian novel that was used to make the fantastic Peter Weir movie, "Master & Commander: The Far Side of the World." That movie borrowed several plots and ideas from many different novels in the entire series - you will surely recognize some of them in this book, but not all. For fans of the movie, this is a good thing - it will encourage you to read all the other novels as well. And you will be glad you did.

The reviews I've read all follow a consistent theme - those familiar with the Aubrey/Maturin series are generally pleased with this outing, and those who made this their first adventure with Jack and Stephen in print disliked it.

Well, I can see why.

This is indeed one of the series' odder books, as it is a series of misadventures and personal setbacks for all concerned. Within this book, various crewmen onboard the HMS Surprise suffer lightning strikes, groundings, secret affairs, incredible seas south of Cape Horn, botched abortions, murders, mysterious hauntings, suicide, falling overboard, drifting in the ocean, near human sacrifice, head injury, coma, and being cast away on two separate desert isles. All this, and the usual disappointment to the naturalists onboard as they sail past the Galapagos with "not a moment to lose".

If you know and love these characters, as any reader of Master and Commander and particularly Post Captain will do, then all of this is endurable and in fact, enlightening as it exposes us to a different view of these characters than is usual.

If you come upon them cold, then you get no glimpse of the very qualities that make one desire to sail with these men, and to read 20 separate volumes on their lives, loves and adventures. Jack has little opportunity for combat or distinction. Stephen has small chance to exercise his fiery intelligence and secret espionage skills. But if you know these men and their compatriots, then this outing is rewarding, and often amusing.

So, to sum it up, DON'T START WITH THIS BOOK. It would be like walking into "Gone with the Wind" 1/2 way through - interesting but confusing. Start with Master and Commander or Post Captain, and you'll find yourself hooked, and then when you do read this book, you'll find it rewarding.

Note for new readers, or those inspired to read by the movie: For those of you who are beginning this amazing series, or are expecting a close re-telling of the movie starring Russell Crowe, please read the next few sentences closely. This book is the 10th in a series that detail the life and adventures of two best friends and their companions in the British Royal Navy during the Napoleonic Wars (rough timeline 1805-1812). The recent movie contains the titles of two these novels "Master and Commander", the first of the series, and this novel "The Far Side of the World"; this choice for the movie's title is more than symbolic, the director and script writers have actually taken events, conversations, battles and plot lines from the entire series, and has combined them in new and interesting ways. So, if you're fresh from the movie theater or just watched a new DVD and are excited to experience `the book' version, you should not expect a close retelling. I think of the movie as a new adventure with Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin, and you can think of this book in the same light. And I believe the concept does the story and the characters justice: in Patrick O'Brian's own brief forward he even speculates on this same possibility -although in a purely literary sense- "and it is possible that in the near future the author (if the readers will bear with him) may be led to make use of hypothetical years, rather like those hypothetical moons used in the calculation of Easter: an 1812a as it were or even an 1812b" (page12). Additionally, I will highly recommend that you start your foray into the nautical world of Napoleon's time with the initial novel of the Aubrey/Maturin Series.

"The Far Side of the World" picks up directly where "Treason's Harbour" left off. Jack Aubrey is in the Mediterranean and coming to terms with the disastrous results of his previous mission involving a violent Barbary city-state secretly allied with France: one ship-of-the-line destroyed, the Surprise barely managing to escape- though through elegant and cunning seamanship, Aubrey led an enemy frigate onto a shoal and destroying her. However, despite what may on the surface seem disastrous is in fact not altogether a failure when the balance of naval power in the region is considered, and Aubrey is given a mission that will take him across the globe in pursuit of an enemy American frigate on course to wreck havoc on British Whalers in the Pacific. Here is the first considerable departure from the movie- the enemy is American due to the War of 1812, rather than the more comfortable villain of France (the movie-makers bow to the audience in the USA and us Patriots around the world).

As the story unfolds, Jack and Stephen must contend with a very attractive impotent Gunner's wife and the chaos she unwittingly ferments in the crew; the adultery it leads to and its final horrifying culmination. Jack and Stephen's most trying adventure occurs lost at sea without a ship, and their deadly rescue by a tribe of cannibal man-hating Pacific Islanders- and throughout the journey they must contend with unnatural bad weather. When the American frigate Norfolk is finally in their sights, the culmination of the story will completely surprise viewers of the movie, and satisfy readers intent on setting sail into another adventure. . .

This story is more focused on life at sea, the particular challenges of the capricious ocean, and the psychology that develops between a small group of people held together in amazingly small confines. It does not satisfy my craving for the gunpowder and saber action found in previous and later novels, but it is a critical juncture in the series, beginning Jack and Stephen's next long journey through the far side of the world.

Jack Aubrey, captain of HMS Surprise, sets off to intercept an American vessel that's been assigned to harass British shipping and whaling in the Pacific. From the viewpoint of an Englishman in Nelson's time, he's literally been sent to the far side of the world.

There are 20 novels about Captain Aubrey and his close friend, ship's surgeon Stephen Maturin. Despite my long-standing affection for this genre (C.S. Forester and Alexander Kent are old friends), I've frankly avoided the Aubrey-Maturin series because I didn't want to find myself chasing down all of its volumes. I picked this book up remaindered, after seeing the recent film. My reaction to O'Brian's original tale won't be colored here (I hope) by my enjoyment of the movie, because the two stories simply are not one and the same. This novel wouldn't have made an audience-pleasing screenplay without drastic changes, and I can only applaud the film's writers for the transformation they worked. But, with that said...

THE FAR SIDE OF THE WORLD is a sea story for those who already hold its genre dear. More time than I as a newcomer to the series needed was spent "catching up" on the characters' past lives, but I could see why O'Brian thought it necessary to offer the information. The book's pace is leisurely, and the author seems far more interested in characterization and historical detail than in rousing action sequences. This works beautifully as far as it goes - I read immersed in the time and place, and I came to know Jack Aubrey quite well in the relatively brief space of this one book. Yet when I came to the ending, and witnessed what could have been a visceral conflict from a bystander's viewpoint - and had to put up with being told what had just happened, instead of being allowed to see and feel it with one of the participants - I closed the book feeling let down. No, I'm not hooked on this series as a result of having read THE FAR SIDE OF THE WORLD. But neither am I so disappointed that I won't be willing to sample it again, if a similar opportunity presents itself.

The recent film Master & Commander: The Far Side of the World sparked my interest in Patrick O'Brian's lengthy series of nautical adventures featuring Capt. Jack Aubrey and his close friend and ship's doctor, Stephen Maturin. While the source novel, The Far Side of the World, comes at a midpoint in O'Brian's chronology, it provides a familiar port for a movie fan to embark on the journey. (Had I read the book before seeing the movie, this might be an entirely different review; now, a comparison between the two is inevitable.)

O'Brian's novel is an intelligent, fascinating look at British naval life during the Napoleanic wars. The author quickly draws readers into the world of seamanship and His Majesty's Navy, filling the pages with rich images and jargon that bring a bygone era back to life with less flash but more substance. Book and movie are both enjoyable and absorbing; still, readers will find very little resemblance here, as the movie draws very few scenes and plot twists from O'Brian's text.

Characters, on the other hand, are better developed in these pages, and there are more of them to boot. Relationships aboard ship are more fully explored and there are even a few women -- a handful of officer's wives -- among the passengers. Subplots dealing with international intrigue, shipboard romance and murder (that were dropped entirely from the movie script) kept my interest level high. There is plenty of humor, too, providing the occasional elbow jab in the ribs and hearty chuckle.

The novel can be slow-moving at times; it seems an endless wait before HMS Surprise and her crew even leave port! But there's interest in the details even while bound to land -- Maturin's eccentric fascination for birds, for instance, and the gauntlet of formal meetings and informal callers Aubrey must deal with as he tries to hasten his ship's departure. The voyage itself, to action hounds, will seem interminable. The U.S. frigate Aubrey has been ordered to find and take or destroy doesn't even appear until more than 200 pages have passed -- and even then, it passes quickly by. The cat-and-mouse game that dominated the movie is, here, more mouse than cat.

Don't read the book looking for great sea battles, cannons blazing and cutlasses at the ready, either. There is no great sea battle at the climax, but O'Brian's denouement is satisfyingly unexpected.

I kept turning pages with unflagging eagerness as the story unfolded. The Far Side of the World is not high adventure, but it is historical fiction of the highest order.

As O'Brian admits in his Introduction to this tenth volume in the Aubrey/Maturin series, he's beginning to run out of history; had he known the first novel would even *become* a series, he would have begun much earlier in Capt. Jack Aubrey's career. The result is that, where each of the earlier volumes was a self-contained narrative, with a few months, or even a few years, of dead space between it and the next, each of the most recent stories ends with a cliffhanger and seques directly into the next yarn. This one is also much more a story of maritime life and its hardships than a naval adventure, with Jack taking the JOYFUL SURPRISE out of the Mediterranean, down to the South Atlantic, around the Horn, and into the vast and still largely uncharted mid-Pacific in pursuit of the U.S. Navy's NORFOLK, sent to harrass the British whaling fleet. It's a long, hard, generally uncomfortable trek, with Aubrey and Maturin being marooned -- twice. There's also more of the soap opera element in this one, with a parallel story of onboard adultery and murder. For me, the most interesting episode is the pair's encounter with the feminist crew of a South Seas double-hulled ocean-going canoe. This volume is a lot of fun for the experienced reader of O'Brian's novels, but I wouldn't necessarily recommend it for a reader new to the series.

This abridged audio version of The Far Side Of The World, from the rousing Aubrey-Maturin series of books, by the late Patrick O'Brian, features a ripping adventure of ships and sea. Mr. Tim Piggott-Smith (best known for portraying that right b-----d Ronald Merrick, in the Jewel In The Crown, and well played was that role too, by Mr. Piggott-Smith, gives a wonderful reading, employing his many talents as an actor, with the various voices (including an American? one) to bring the adventure to life. The story surrounds the adventures of Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin on the Surprise, one of her majesty's ships. Beyond that, you'll have to listen, sorry. I also recommend The Commodore and Master and Commander (not necessarily the "Crowe" version). I might caution the listener/reader to pick up a copy of "A Sea Of Words" in the latest addition, as the nautical terms might throw one for a "loop", as they are almost a language in themselves. It doesn't diminish this fine seafaring adventure. For all of us "landlubbers" who fancy themselves (in our minds) seamen.

Patrick O'Brian himself seemed to recognize, in his prefatory comments, that The Far Side of the World was unequivocally his weakest effort in the series to this point. Plot is virtually non-existent: take command (again) of the HMS Surprise to find, and deal with, the USS Norfolk, which is harassing British whalers in the South Seas. Period. The novel nevertheless has a captivating title, which explains the decision by Universal-Miramax-Fox (which studio DOESN'T have a piece?) to cobble together the titles of the first and the tenth Aubrey-Maturin installments into possibly the single longest film title of the season. (And, judging from the trailer and the promotional materials, the movie will have absolutely nothing to do with The Far Side of the World beyond the appropriation of its title.)
What this novel displays amid its linear spareness, however, is O'Brian's particular genius in characterization, his anthropological eye for the details of nautical life during the Regency, and his love of imparting - in impeccably wrought, Austenian prose - the arcane bit of datum, observation, procedure, or lore. Working within a lean plot structure, he fills his customary 300-plus pages with new turns on his by-now signature themes and concerns - friendship, love, betrayal, heroism, integrity, leadership (indeed, a surpassingly good volume on "leadership" could be compiled from these books) - while continuing to build an encyclopedic account of life at sea in the early 19th Century.
The humanity of O'Brian's two principal characters, and the manner in which both they and their relationship develop over the course of the series, is the essence of the literary miracle O'Brian has created. His hero, Captain Jack Aubrey, a lion at sea and a naïf ashore, has by the time of this novel been more than two years at sea, has left his beloved wife to deal with an army of creditors and bad business deals, and must bear the weight of a blustering father who, as a member of Parliament and the Radical anti-government interest, gives Admiralty leadership what justification it requires to disfavor Aubrey. Stephen Maturin - ship's surgeon, "natural philosopher," and naval intelligence operative par excellence - is Aubrey's "particular friend" (and, I presume, O'Brian's idealized literary self, in knee-breeches and smudged silk stockings). A brilliant epitome of the Enlightenment, Maturin, an Irish "papist," is uncommonly learned, wise in the ways of human frailty, as cunning ashore as Aubrey is naïve, and hopelessly in love with a woman whose fidelity he can never ensure.
On their long voyage around the Horn to the "far side of the world," O'Brian has time to develop detailed expositions on aspects of seamanship and life at sea - objects of long research in the naval archives and among his own acquisitions - on which in the course of the series he has yet to comment. He provides discourses on whaling (for the unabridged version, see Moby Dick), the provisioning of ships, the education of "squeakers" - the young midshipmen who ship with Aubrey - ways to float ships grounded on sandbars at low tide, the society of seaman at sea and their omerta-like rules of conduct, and so much more.
Of course, by this 10th Aubrey-Maturin novel, O'Brian knew he was in for the long haul. Here, as throughout the series, he demonstrates a sure mastery of pacing, planting a variety of ticking time bombs - for example, letters that will not be read until subsequent novels - and ties up, wholly or partially, ends left loose from earlier installments. (I would imagine these to be difficult novels to read out of sequence, even though O'Brian is diligent in trying to fill in necessary detail without becoming tedious to devotees.) Secondary characters like Sophie Aubrey, Diana Villiers, Aubrey's steward Killick and other members of ship's company, and assorted friends, heroes, villains, knaves, and simple walk-ons are all etched sharply by O'Brian and, if they're around for more than one tale, show a stable core of personality amid human variableness and growth. As an single example, I point to the development of the disturbing Mr. Andrew Wray - a senior Admiralty official of many sinister attributes who makes a brief but important appearance here - as being particularly impressive over several books.
Worthier reviewers than I claim these novels to comprise the finest literary series ever written. I cannot imagine anyone reading more than one and not agreeing. Each book is at once wholly familiar yet entirely different from its predecessors, set in O'Brian's uniquely realized world, as fascinating ashore as at sea - with everything floating in O'Brian's poetic prose. Each book is worth the effort to encounter.
But you may need help. I did. As companions to O'Brian's unstintingly accurate period language and settings - and particularly those who will never intuitively understand the meaning of "wear ship" or "haul wind" - I recommend the helpful work of Dean King, O'Brian's unauthorized biographer, who has compiled two indispensable reference works, a glossary and a gazetteer.
And while I'm at it, permit me to commend the astonishing Recorded Books Unabridged editions of the Aubrey-Maturin novels, narrated by the incomparable Patrick Tull, who, with a myriad of accurate dialects and accents, transforms bare words on a page into spoken dramas of subtle beauty and rare power.

If you are interested in reading this book because of the movie don't start with this one. The movie does a pretty good job of capturing a one dimensional snapshot of Steven and Jack but they are far richer people than the movie can portray. Each book has been written in such a way that it can be enjoyed as a stand alone novel but to get the very best out of it you need to start with the first one. I just finished the last book last night and am deeply sorry, in a way, that it was never finished before Patrick passed away. On the other hand it seems almost right that there is no final period to this wonderful saga.

Patrick O'Brian has done a wonderful job of creating a cast of interesting and conceivably real people that have enough depth to keep you interested. They all have their warts as well as their steller performances. The story lines have enough layers and depth to them to keep you interested without overloading you. I can't imagine what it was like to have to wait for the next novel to come out when these were first written.

If you are looking for cannons and thunder on every page you might be a little disapointed at first but the realness of it all will soon draw you in to a period of history that is both beautiful and brutal at the same time. I am actually looking forward to starting this series all over again in the not to distant future and spending a little more time and research on the wealth of information that these books contain. It is a true masterpeice that has and will stand the test of time.

Nothing like the movie. It's not the French they off after, but the American warship Norfolk. Book captures like most of O'Brian's book the feel of sail and the officers & Sailors who manned them. The British led by Captain Awbrey sail Southwest trying to catch up to the Norfolk. His actions chase the Americans into a couple unfortunate ambushes before he is able to capture the Norfolk. Even the, the chase isn't over. Great story.

Having seen the recent movie preview for "Master and Commander", I was intrigued to learn more about this story and its author. Turns out, he has written a whole 'sea chest' of these adventue at sea titles... and this one is a fantastic read!
Closely following history, and using as much detail as possible to keep the reader informed without distracting from the plot, the author both educates and entertains the reader with his detailed knowledge of early 19th century sea life aboard a British war ship. The plot for this title is simple. A British naval ship, with the heroic Commander Jack Aubrey, is sent to puruse and capture a pesky American ship that on a mission to disrupt Btritish whaling operations in the south Pacific.
I liked the book for many reasons. First, I love reading history, and historical ficiton. I love reading about people who had the courage to climb aboard a small wooden ship and sail to the other side of the world knowing that half the crew would probably not survive or return home... It's the modern equivilent of half a dozen guys jumping inside a rocket and launching themselves to the planet Mars, but without GPS navigation, computers and all of the other technical gadgets that we rely on today. They went to unknown and dangerous places as if it was routine. I love these guys... and i loved this book.

I bought this book, along with "Master and Commander," because I was a big fan of the 2003 film starring Russell Crowe, and wanted to read the books that inspired the movie. I was surprised to learn the books are very different from the plot in the film. That didn't bother me, but what does bother me is the storyline. I find it very curious and disappointing that Jack Aubrey and Dr. Maturin allow a murderer to run loose on the ship without really stopping him until it was too late. It made no sense to me how a captain obsessed with doing the right thing and following the articles of war would be so blase about the crew's behavior. Dr. Maturin, who warns his assistant against performing an abortion in the book, does nothing about stopping a killer on board the ship. The illlogic displayed here mystified me.

Another problem I have with the book is that there's not a lot of action. I was shocked that there are barely any naval battles in the book. I expected something much better.

Some critics have referred to the Aubrey/Maturin books as one long novel united not only by their historical setting but also by the central plot element of the Aubrey/Maturin friendship. Having read these fine books over a period of several years, I decided to evaluate their cumulative integrity by reading them consecutively in order of publication over a period of a few weeks. This turned out to be a rewarding enterprise. For readers unfamiliar with these books, they describe the experiences of a Royal Navy officer and his close friend and traveling companion, a naval surgeon. The experiences cover a broad swath of the Napoleonic Wars and virtually the whole globe.
Rereading all the books confirmed that O'Brian is a superb writer and that his ability to evoke the past is outstanding. O'Brian has numerous gifts as a writer. He is the master of the long, careful description, and the short, telling episode. His ability to construct ingenious but creditable plots is first-rate, probably because he based much of the action of his books on actual events. For example, some of the episodes of Jack Aubrey's career are based on the life of the famous frigate captain, Lord Cochrane. O'Brian excels also in his depiction of characters. His ability to develop psychologically creditable characters through a combination of dialogue, comments by other characters, and description is tremendous. O'Brien's interest in psychology went well beyond normal character development, some books contain excellent case studies of anxiety, depression, and mania.
Reading O'Brien gives vivid view of the early 19th century. The historian Bernard Bailyn, writing of colonial America, stated once that the 18th century world was not only pre-industrial but also pre-humanitarian (paraphrase). This is true as well for the early 19th century depicted by O'Brien. The casual and invariable presence of violence, brutality, and death is a theme running through all the books. The constant threats to life are the product not only of natural forces beyond human control, particularly the weather and disease, but also of relative human indifference to suffering. There is nothing particularly romantic about the world O'Brien describes but it also a certain grim grandeur. O'Brien also shows the somewhat transitional nature of the early 19th century. The British Navy and its vessals were the apogee of what could be achieved by pre-industrial technology. This is true both of the technology itself and the social organization needed to produce and use the massive sailing vessals. Aubrey's navy is an organization reflecting its society; an order based on deference, rigid hierarchy, primitive notions of honor, favoritism, and very, very corrupt. At the same time, it was one of the largest and most effective bureaucracies in human history to that time. The nature of service exacted great penalities for failure in a particularly environment, and great success was rewarded greatly. In some ways, it was a ruthless meritocracy whose structure and success anticipates the great expansion of government power and capacity seen in the rest of the 19th century.
O'Brian is also the great writer about male friendship. There are important female characters in these books but since most of the action takes place at sea, male characters predominate. The friendship between Aubrey and Maturin is the central armature of the books and is a brilliant creation. The position of women in these books is ambiguous. There are sympathetic characters, notably Aubrey's long suffering wife. Other women figures, notably Maturin's wife, leave a less positive impression. On board ship, women tend to have a disruptive, even malign influence.
How did O'Brian manage to sustain his achievement over 20 books? Beyond his technical abilities as a writer and the instrinsic interest of the subject, O'Brien made a series of very intelligent choices. He has not one but two major protagonists. The contrasting but equally interesting figures of Aubrey and Maturin allowed O'Brien to a particularly rich opportunity to expose different facets of character development and to vary plots carefully. This is quite difficult and I'm not aware of any other writer who has been able to accomplish such sustained development of two major protagonists for such a prolonged period. O'Brian's use of his historical setting is very creative. The scenes and events in the books literally span the whole globe as Aubrey and Maturin encounter numerous cultures and societies. The naval setting allowed him also to introduce numerous new and interesting characters. O'Brian was able to make his stories attractive to many audiences. Several of these stories can be enjoyed as psychological novels, as adventure stories, as suspense novels, and even one as a legal thriller. O'Brian was also a very funny writer, successful at both broad, low humor, and sophisticated wit. Finally, O'Brian made efforts to link some of the books together. While a number are complete in themselves, others form components of extended, multi-book narratives. Desolation Island, Fortune of War, and The Surgeon's Mate are one such grouping. Treason's Harbor, The Far Side of the World, and The Reverse of the Medal are another. The Letter of Marque and the ensuing 4 books, centered around a circumnavigation, are another.
Though the average quality of the books is remarkably high, some are better than others. I suspect that different readers will have different favorites. I personally prefer some of the books with greater psychological elements. The first book, Master and Commander, is one of my favorites. The last 2 or 3, while good, are not as strong as earlier books. I suspect O'Brian's stream of invention was beginning to diminish. All can be read profitably as stand alone works though there is definitely something to be gained by reading in consecutive order.

I first discovered this series in the Grenadines almost twenty years ago when only the first two volumes were generally available in the US. Since, then, I've decided to read the entire series in order. This is not one of the best of O'Brian's efforts. The book starts out promising, with excellent sections on Brazil and Cape Horn but as the Pacific looms closer, the bones of the plot start to show. The section on the Polynesian women might be worthy of Thomas Pynchon or Italo Calvino but in a series known for its versimilitude, it strains belief. The ending where the British frigate arrives in the nick of time like the cavalry would be a cliche even in a boys' adventure novel. If I read of another improbable rescue of the principals, I may not have the fortitude to continue the series. Add to that a showy locquacity and the usual courtly pretensions of the Tories and you end up with what for me became a disappointment. I'm already well into the next volume and find it much more engaging.

Give these stories a chance! I credit the recent film "Master & Commander" with making the O'Brian series more accessible. One of the best films I have ever seen, it provided a visual context for me when I read the Aubrey/Maturin books. Though the film departs quite a bit for good reason from "The Far Side of the World", I thoroughly enjoyed the book and O'Brian's style of writing. Especially memorable for me was the unorthodox method O'Brian applied for conclusion of the book. Victory is in the air, and he dispenses with the need to drag the book out unnecessarily. Brilliant and revelatory to me!

I really enjoyed many of the incidents and new situations, very creative of the author.

Even though the named after this book, the movie was very different. The movie has parts from books 2, 3 and this one, book 10.

I urge you to read the books in order.

Triggers: it's a war novel expect violence

I have a special relationship with this book because together with Peter Weir I wrote the screenplay for it. O'Brian immersed himself in 19th century literature and writes like a 19th century writer of serialised novels - dozens of characters and nary a thought to how the story would end. This one, more than the others, was a single ship journey with a beginning a middle and and end, which is why we chose it.
Theres a very important character in the story, the gunners wife, who as I remember, (Spoiler alert) travels with the gunner, has a secret affair with midshipman Hollom, becomes pregnant and asks Maturin for an abortion, then kills herself when Maturin (a staunch catholic) refuses, as does Hollom, after the gunner meets his fate.
That was what happened in my first draft of the movie, but then Peter decided, rather brilliantly, that the woman at the centre of this plot was actually a very minor character. That the real story, if you consider the whole series, was about the 'marriage' between Aubrey and Maturin, with young Blakeney is their son who wants to be like both of them ('Is there such a thing as a fighting naturalist') with the rest of the crew as unruly teenagers in this massive floating family. So we tossed the gunners wife overboard ... though she lives on in this wonderful novel.

Patrick O'Brian is an incredible writer and the audio, skillfully delivered, can make a re-reading (or re-listening if you will) all the more pleasurable for finding all the subtle fore-shadowing and sometimes key information that is contained in seemingly throw away asides. All the more reason this audio book version was disappointing as it is heavily abridged. No complaints about the reader Tim Pigot-Smith, he has the right voice and tone throughout, but the decision by the producers to edit O'Brian is unforgivable. I prefer to stick with the Patrick Tull readings (I find the Simon Vance readings make Jack Aubrey sound like a pompous ass), which bring the material to vibrant life and enhance the enjoyment of this special series.

Throughout his brilliant Aubrey/Maturin series, O'Brian has delighted his readers with the uneasy juxtaposition of order and chaos. The tension between the two reaches a fever pitch in "The Far Side of the World."
The title itself resonates with the struggle. Perhaps it had a literal meaning during the Age of Sail but, today, with jet travel and the internet changing our entire conception of time and space, the phrase seems archaic, as though the natural order we so take for granted is about to be stood on its head, and O'Brian is, indeed, taking us to the "far side"-- into a dark, chaotic world dimly perceived, little understood.
For O'Brian, a single, solitary female is usually enough to create tension and discord in an otherwise well regulated Man of War. That happens with Mrs. Wogan in "Desolation Island" and Clarissa Oaks in "The Truelove". Both women are stand-ins for the ultimate female provocateur of the entie series, Diane Villiers, who nearly destroys Aubrey's career in "Post Captain" and temporarily turns Maturin into a heart broken opium eater.
But in "The Far Side", 19-year old Mrs. Horner creates more than tension and discord aboard the HMS Surprise. Her adulterous affair leads to utter chaos and despair. O'Brian seemingly ties the entire plot together with the letter "H". There's Mr & Mrs. Horner, Hollum (the adulterer), Higgins (the abortionist), Howard (the callous, blood-thirsty marine,) and last but not least, the Greek Tragedian, Homer. The poetical Lt. Mowett is reading the Iliad, and on a dark, stormy night Maturin opines that Homer's Iliad is not only, "...the great epic of the world...," it is also, "a continued outcry against adultery."
Although he has no "H", the ventriloquist, Comptom, is all about chaos. His ability to project his voice in a shrill, inhuman fashion is another blow to the natural order. After one weird stunt right in front of no one less than the Captain, Aubrey tells Maturin, "It was the strangest experience: there he was, telling me things to my face as though he were invisible."
Later, at night, Jack Aubrey botches a familiar violin transition and Maturin admits that, "I was uneasy in my mind before we ever sat down; and for once music has not answered." For Maturin to admit that his playing with Aubrey for once "has not answered"-- he's saying a lot! Their music binds the two together. Music is how they express their devotion to one another book after book. And, now, the beauty and internal logic of music, which is somehow related to the system of math and the harmonic path of planets and stars, which in turn, are the well-spring of time and navigation-- well, all of it is out of sorts.
The sweet balm of music is so much wormwood for Maturin because, not only is there adultery aboard ship, Maturin has been receiving malicious letters from home alleging the infidelity of his wife, Diane Villiers.
Adultery, in short, is chaos. And adultery, abortion and murder coalesce in one of the eeriest scenes I can recall from the entire series. Howard shoots a baby manatee, and that night its mother commences a human-like wail for its child, circling the ship and spooking the entire crew. Not even "time" can stand the strain anymore. A marine sentinel caught up in the terror forgets to flip the watch glass and Aubrey cries out, "God's my life. What the devil are you thinking of? Turn the glass and strike the bell."
If you're racing through the Aubrey/Maturin series, strike your topgallants and drift awhile through the waters of "The Far Side". It's quite a voyage!

The reviewer from Sherman Oaks is right at least on one point. Hollywood has found HMS Surprise and Captain Aubrey! Director Peter Weir is now filming an adaptation of this novel with Russel Crowe as the captain (and his Princeton roommate Paul Bettany plays his... companion Stephen Maturin). I heard that the studio where Titanic was filmed is being used. They picked the 10th novel because it was said to have a "simpler and clearer plot". Can't say I agree, but I can see their reason. The film should come out around 2003, but why wait? Read it now and enjoy the excitement and fun of the adventures of Aubrey and Maturin! I heard that the movie will move the scene from 1812 to 1806 and the enemy is now a French frigate not an American one! I guess one should have expected such treatment from American Hollywood.... although I am still glad that they decided to film it. It just shows how good the novel is. Enjoy!

The tenth volume in O'Brian's wonderfully intelligent nautical series finds Captain Aubrey and Stephen Maturin in Gibraltar, still aboard the Surprise. Their mission is to track an American ship down the Atlantic and on to the largely uncharted Pacific whaling grounds. While "Far Side of the World" contains none of the heart-pounding muzzle-to-muzzle naval battles that readers have come to expect in O'Brian's stories, it contains lots of imaginative plot twists nonetheless. A strange and tragic love triangle, a raft full of primitive lesbians, Maturin's disappointing visit to the Galapagos, and an oddly gripping denouement as the Surprises confront their American nemeses. The book is entirely afloat, with pit stops to refit, but no extended periods ashore with family or engaged in intelligence affairs. Maturin's friendship with Dr. Martin, a naturalist parson, provides comic relief at every turn.
O'Brian never fails to please. This book smoothly picks up where the last one left off, and leaves a thread or two dangling to launch the next volume. As always, the writing is brilliant and spare, the characters complex and developed, and the adventures well-researched, founded in British naval histories. Another great voyage.

when younger I traveled from midwest to los angeles 45+ times a year. found patrick o' brian's novels on tape / disk. I LOVED THEM ,, PLAYED MANY TIMES AND THE MILES JUST FLEW BY HAVE A TOOL BOX FULL

Rich characters, refreshing originality, a good story, and plenty of surprises. Not much to criticize except to say the story is unorthodox and the ending is peculiar...both of which add to the satisfaction if you like the unexpected. I was looking for something different and absorbing and was rewarded with O'Brian's work. Highly recommended.

There are twenty of the Aubrey/Maturin naval adventures all about ships and the high tides and storms on the ocean. This one was made into a movie starring that guy who deserted Meg Ryan. I was told by a 'prejudiced' person that it was the worst movie made, so I skipped it. I was upset at him for not sticking with poor Meg who almost lost her career because of their on-again-off-again affair. He acted marvelously as John in 'The Beautiful Mind' and I did buy the DVD of 'The Gladiator.' Next time, I will not listen to other's opinions of movies as I like to do that in this fashion.

Patrick O'Brian advises that "the reader will meet no basilisks that destroy with their eyes, no Hottentots without religion, policy or articulate language." He declares that Geoffrey Chaucer borrowed from both the living and the dead with his tales of Canterbury and other writings. Shakespeare, in his opinion, invented 'nothing' but my! he has a way with words to make it seem like it was his original idea in everything he wrote. There were concerns for some time that Shakespeare didn't even write his own work.

Jack Aubrey and his confidante, the ship's surgeon Stephem Maturin, had many adventures filled with murder, shipwrecks, and rescues in the Pacific Ocean. This episode in the fictitious life of Aubrey, a captain in Nelson's British Navy. He must intercept a frigate intent on wrecking havoc among the whaling ships for Her Majesty's Royal Navy.

Darwin proclaims: "Down the white hills dissolving torrents pour,

Green springs the turf, and purple blows the flower,

His torpid wing the Rail exulting tries,

Mounts the soft gale, and wantons in the sky..."

In his 'Origin of Society,' he wrote:

"Behold!" he cries "Earth! Ocean! Air above,

And hail the Deities of Sexual Love!

All forms of live shall this fond pair delight,

And sex to sex the willing world unite."

O'Brian has a book out of his short story collection, several other novels in addition to this series, and biographies of Picasso and Joseph Banks.

Another good tale that follows some little known historical events and the tremendous dangers seafarers faced. Fun to see the Galapagos Islands before Darwin with hints of what's to come. There are fascinating details on whales and whaling that would interest even landlubbers. Some quite surprising twists, from lesbian cannibals of Polynesia to 18th century abortion procedures again shows the wonderful depth of O'Brian's storytelling. A very fun read.

My husband LOVES this series of books, and has been collecting them. The newer addition (post 1992) had covers like you can see in the online picture, and the neat thing about them is that when you put the bindings of the series together, it forms a picture. Unfortunately, we thought we were ordering the same edition (that's what it says in the information about the book), and we received this book in the old edition, which does not match. Needless to say, my husband was disappointed. But I would definitely recommend the series.

First of all, let us dispose of one possible connection that may exist in some reader's mind: There is utterly no similarity between the motion picture "Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World" and this novel except for the names of the major protagonists. If one has watched the motion picture and hesitates to read the book, fearing it will be repetitious, dismiss that misapprehension. The book and film are recognizably separate. Now then, on to the qualities of the novel.

This is the tenth book of the series of seafaring novels featuring Post-Captain Jack Aubrey and Dr. Stephen Maturin, part surgeon, part spy. It is also by far the best written of the series to date (that is, the best of the first ten books, for I have yet to read the following volumes). Patrick O'Brian, whose real name is the very English and very non-Irish Richard Russ, has consistently shown at least three annoying weaknesses in his writing, all of which are almost absent from THE FAR SIDE OF THE WORLD:

First, O'Brian/Russ has the trait of eliding time. One line of text, for example, may have the captain calling for a mate, and in the very next line he will be speaking to that mate, absolutely no time having elapsed between the two acts. Even the transporter on the Starship Enterprise requires a few seconds to reassemble the molecules of the transportee, but not O'Brian. In his books, time can be folded upon itself, it seems. Surprisingly and happily, however, I can recall only a single instance of this nonsense in THE FAR SIDE OF THE WORLD. Bravo!

Second, O'Brian/Russ is fond of cobbling together entire paragraphs of late 18th and early 19th century nautical jargon which may or may not be technically accurate. The typical modern reader has no way of knowing, and such descriptions of spritsails and staysails and bowlines and rigging and lines and boots and whatnot come across pretty much as just so much gibberish. Again, though, there is only one instance of really extended incomprehensible verbiage in the novel, so again, I must say "Bravo, O'Brian. Your writing is improving dramatically!"

Third, the reader's understanding of several of the preceding nine novels in this series is highly dependent upon having read the books in chronological order and proper sequence. Numerous references to people, ships and actions can be interpreted only with a knowledge of what preceded their reappearance in a given volume. THE FAR SIDE OF THE WORLD is an exception. Yes, references to earlier events do occasionally appear, but they are neither so obscure nor so important to the story line that one has to be able to recollect them from earlier books. This volume actually could be read in isolation from the rest of the series and be enjoyed in its own right.

So, for all intents and purposes, is this volume flawless? Well, in a word, no. Things are progressing nicely, i.e., believably, until Maturin falls out of a window of the captain's Great Cabin in the stern of HMS Surprise and Aubrey leaps into the water to succor him. The carousing crew cannot hear their hails, and the ship sails off, leaving our two heroes to float in the Pacific Ocean the entire night. The next day, they are indeed rescued--by a group of male-emasculating, tattooed, cannibal vixens sailing some sort of huge outrigger canoe sporting a thatched hut. This brings the believability of the fiction to a screaming halt. Any suggestion of verisimilitude vanishes without a trace in the face of these savage females traveling the Pacific on their ocean-going canoe festooned with severed male genitalia while their captain munches on a smoked human hand. Although the novel soon regains its claim to be realistic historical fiction, the image of this "Twilight Zone" episode lingers with the reader until the end and weakens the believability of the story line from the point of its occurrence onward.

All in all, though, the nasty cannibal interlude notwithstanding, THE FAR SIDE OF THE WORLD is an entertaining and generally engrossing read. Balancing its strengths and weaknesses, it remains the best written of all the books in the series thus far and can stir the reader's imagination for several evenings with its images of life between water and sail. Based purely on its entertainment value and with a nod to the stylistic improvements I've mentioned above, I feel comfortable in characterizing the book with four the store stars.

I've read the entire Aubrey/Maturin series multiple times and I always come back to this book as the finest in the series - it has an astonishing range of stories, characters, and events and the scale of the challenges our hero's face are incredible. It's an amazing act of imagination. I highly recommend this - even as a stand-alone read it's among the finest novels I've ever encoutered.