Hoare and the Matter of Treason: A Maritime Mystery Featuring Captain Bartholomew Hoare - Hardcover

Perkins, Wilder

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 031227291X ISBN 13: 9780312272913

Publisher: Minotaur Books, 2001

Synopsis

At the request of King George III, British naval officer Bartholomew Hoare searches for a traitor at the highest levels of the Admiralty. By the author of Hoare and the Headless Captains.

About this title

From Publishers Weekly:

Sadly, this is last (and third) installment in a cleverly conceived, brilliantly executed series featuring Commander Bartholomew Hoare of His Majesty George III's Royal Navy. With his hoarse-voiced whisper (legacy of a musket ball), Hoare is an unusual naval officer, while his command, the Royal Duke, is equally unusual and unorthodox. The brig serves as a floating spy center with a crew of men and women whose least skills are seamanship. In fact, the Royal Duke's standing orders preclude it from setting to sea at all until extraordinary circumstances contravene them. Called to London, Hoare receives orders from Admiral Sir Hugh Abercrombie to locate and retrieve sensitive documents lost or stolen from the Admiralty. Hoare later finds himself confronting an old enemy as well as an unnamed nemesis whom he's thwarted in the past. Deadly treason threatens the government and Hoare personally when his new wife and his ward are kidnapped and he must gamble for their lives. The appearance of historical (Jane Austen) and legendary (Horatio Hornblower) characters enhances the pleasure. Despite sometimes quirky sentence structure, this novel, which Perkins completed shortly before his death in 1999, is a solidly entertaining blend of period adventure and mystery. (Apr. 7)Forecast: St. Martin's has no publicity scheduled for this title, which obviously won't help sales, but, if alerted to the high quality of this book and its predecessors, Patrick O'Brian fans should sail into them with relish, undaunted by the end of the series.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist:

The final installment in Perkins' excellent series of maritime mysteries featuring Georgian naval officer Bartholomew Hoare is brimming with action and intrigue. Although incapable of speaking above a whisper because of a crushed larynx, Hoare takes advantage of his handicap in his capacity as an undercover agent for the Royal Navy. When a packet of sensitive government documents is stolen from the Admiralty, Hoare is called upon to investigate. Bidding a reluctant farewell to his new bride, he embarks on a secret mission, uncovering a treasonous plot to depose the king and smashing a nefarious ring of spies operating on behalf of Napoleon Bonaparte. A suitably suspenseful conclusion to a dynamic adventure series. Margaret Flanagan
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

About this edition

• Publisher: Minotaur Books
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 031227291X
• ISBN 13: 9780312272913
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 215