Great Naval Fiction Books

[histgamer]

Ok I know it is a totally different time period but I was curious who all here has read the Horatio Hornblower Series of books and who has read the Patrick O Brian books that take a lot from Forester's Hornblower books O Brian is more popular recently since one of the 21 Aubrey Martin series books was made into a major motion picture though it was changed a lot. Master and Commander far Side of the world is closest to the 17th book of the series though draws on various items from any of 8 different books within the series.

Also does anyone have any other Naval Fiction recommendations? The Hornblower Books set the standard in my opinion they are among the best I have ever read.

[Gen.Hoepner]

I love Hornblower!!! Really! I've swallowed the whole serie in 1 week! It's amazing imho. The O'brian's ones are a bit too repeatitive imho...but however they're good.
There's also a very good tv-serie about Hornblower, a british production i think made by BBC...
 
 

[histgamer]

You talking bout the mini series with Ioan as Hornblower? They took a very creative license with him i must say, I got into it because we read Lt Hornblower as a classic in my sophmore Classics class but yea Hornblower is very very good writing, I had trouble getting into the last one though as there are many books out there with similar plots trying to escape napoleon from his second island of captivity and all.

[Micke II]

From Hornblower's story a excellent movie has been produced in 2003: Masters and Commanders with Russell Crowe.
For fans of good story and adventures at sea !

[soeren01]

Try Alexander Kent (The Bolitho Novels) very similar to Hornblower

[histgamer]

Micke II

Master and Commander is not based on the Hornblower books. It is based on a series of books that were written from 1970-2001 by Patrick O'Brian, Master and Commander was the first of the 21 titles however the movie Master and Commander is actually based on the 17th book titled simply The Far Side of The World.

Patrick O'Brian did however take alot of ideas from the Hornblower Series and adopted them into his books.

[Ron Saueracker]

I've read the Hornblowers, but off and on when I found one. The Patrick O'Brien books I find OK but it's almost too in depth...leaves nothing to the imagination. Now the Alexander Kent Books..(Douglas Reeman by the way) I was hooked on in my teens...read them all. Thomas Herrick, the trusty Allday, the doable Chenney.[;)] Ahhh...great read.

[histgamer]

Gotta go with Hornblower, Kent and O'brian don't occur without Forrester's Hornblower books.

[Bill Durrant]

I preferred Bolitho - Sharpe on water.

[Mike Scholl]

Own and have read them all, though the first several of the O'Brian series are the best historically. Kent was the most farsighted of the three in starting his saga during the American Revolution. O'Brian runs into big trouble when the series proved popular but he'd "run out of war" to write about. The last bunch all seem to take place in the same few years. But all are great fun to read.

[Panther Bait]

A little off topic, but if you like the Hornblower books, try the Honor Harrington books by David Weber.  They are science fiction (these are space ships, not sailing ships), but many people compare them favorably in style to the Hornblower series.  Also, the author himself acknowledges that "Horatio Hornblower in Space" was his inspiration when he started the series.

[rockmedic109]

I agree with the Alexander Kent books.  I even liked them better than the Hornblower books.  I also liked the Lord Ramage books {I was only able to get the first four books};  I cannot remember the author's name though. 
 
I had a hard time getting into the O'Brien books. 
 
There was another writer who had a series with the main character being George Abercrombie Fox......This was much more a "Sharpe" at sea than Kent!  Like the Ramage novels, I was only able to acquire the first two before I stopped reading at work and started playing on a laptop.
 
And I thought the Hornblower books were a little "simple" for want of a better word.  Might be perception due to reading the Bolitho series first because reading C.S. Forester's non-fiction books certainly gave no impression of "simple".

[sprior]

Try "The Crual Sea", one of the best naval fiction books ever. Also, try "Escort", not fiction but you wouldn't know it if you read it.

[Ron Saueracker]

"A Prayer For The Ship" is amazing. Can't recall the author right now but it was about a fictional Arethusa Class CL named HMS Antigone. Fabulous. The Harry Homewood sub novels rock as well.

[bradfordkay]

There's a single book, "Master Mariner: Running Proud" - i forget the author - that was excellent, though there are stints of civilian merchant service in there.

I also recommend Dewey Lambdin's series similar to the Alexander Kent novels.

[Andy Mac]

I alway liked "A ship must die" by Reeman he did some good books some of the post WW2 ones were good as well

I am a heretic but I prefereed Kent's Bolitho series over Hornblower or O'Brien they were just great.

(p.s. I am also a huge Weber fan so I know what you mean Pantherbait - Alastair McKeon, Horace Harkness and Scotty Tremaine always reminded me of some of the characters out of Hornblower or Kents books even though it was set in space and he was like the 8th character [:D]) 

[witpqs]

Are the Hornblower books in the public domain yet? I was looking at Gutenberg and didn't see anything by the author (C.S. Forester).

[Hipper]

Try the Richard Woodman books
a brig of war etc

very close to the hornblower novels in spirit, a bit more downbeat than Patrick O'Brien. tries to be a bit out of the ordinary in terms of setting and plot

[mikemike]

There is the Kydd series by Julian Stockwin - following the career of a Navy man who started off as a pressed crewmember. A bit of a different perspective. Theree's also Dan Parkinson's books about John Singleton Ramsey - a U.S. hero for a change.

As far as rating the books - Forester is, of course, the classic, but neither the author nor his hero have much of a sense of humor. That is what you will find permeating O'Brien's books - in a subtle form. O'Brien wrote novels rather than naval-war novels, which makes for a generally slower pace, but they are good reads. Also, his characters use the most authentic-sounding language. Ramage, Hornblower and Bolitho all use more-or-less 20th century English.

Alexander Kent, I think, made the mistake of telling from the start he'd kill off Bolitho in 1815. I think that was kind of a spoiler for the series. While the books have interesting plots, he is too fond of killing off his personnel. I don't think naval combat was quite that bloody at the time. That goes in spades for his more modern fiction, written as Douglas Reeman, where he doesn't need to conserve characters for a follow-on. But can be entertaining in judicious doses.

Ramage started off well, but the books became too repetitive and formulaic. I think the author finally lost interest when Ramage was promoted to captain of a ship of the line.

Richard Woodman's books are worthwhile, too, more cloak-and-dagger stuff in there.

For more modern stuff, there is also Forester: "The Ship", about a British CL in the Med, "The Good Shepherd", about a U.S. destroyer captain on convoy duty in the Atlantic; there were also stories about a fictitious Tribal class destroyer in the Med: "HMS Apache"; a WWI novel called "Brown on Resolution", downbeat but a good read.
Alistair Maclean of course, but his books border on fantasy. Alexander Fullerton's Everard saga has unusual locations, but I find him too jingoistic, his characters seem to regard killing Germans as a calling (and of course all Germans are and always have been evil like Sauron); maybe the stuff was written too soon after the war.

[pompack]

ORIGINAL: Panther Bait

A little off topic, but if you like the Hornblower books, try the Honor Harrington books by David Weber.  They are science fiction (these are space ships, not sailing ships), but many people compare them favorably in style to the Hornblower series.  Also, the author himself acknowledges that "Horation Hornblower in Space" was his inspiration when he started the series.

Have to agree. By the time I was 20 I had read every Hornblower book at least three times. Over the four decades since I have tried to find other authors that captured that "Hornblower flavor" but only Weber comes close.

Before we leave Foresterbehind though, don't overlook The Good Shepherd. A fantastic yarn with great characterization as well as full of sea lore.