Book description
1812 and the fate of Europe lies in the hands of newly appointed
Commodore Hornblower . . .
Dispatched to northern waters to protect Britain's Baltic interests,
Horatio Hornblower must halt the advance of Napoleon's empire into
Sweden and Russia. But first he must battle the terrible Baltic
weather: fog, snow and icebound waterways; overcome Russian political
and commercial intrigues; avoid the seductive charms of royalty as
well as the deadly reach of assassins in the imperial palace; and
contend with hostile armies and French privateers. With the fate of
Europe balanced on a knife edge, the responsibility lies heavy on a
Commodore's shoulders . . .
This is the eighth of eleven books chronicling the adventures of C.
S. Forester's inimitable nautical hero, Horatio Hornblower.
C. S. Forester was born in Cairo in 1899, where his father was
stationed as a government official. He studied medicine at Guy's
Hospital, and after leaving Guy's without a degree he turned to writing
as a career. On the outbreak of war he entered the Ministry of
Information and later he sailed with the Royal Navy to collect material
for
The Ship
. He made a voyage to the Bering Sea to gather material for a similar
book on the United States Navy, and it was during this trip that he was
stricken with arteriosclerosis, a disease which left him crippled.
However, he continued to write and in the Hornblower novels created the
most renowned sailor in contemporary fiction. He died in 1966.
