I'm only part-way through this, but enthusiasm made me review before finishing. It achieves the rare feat of being highly technical, crystal clear, and thoroughly readable, all at the same time. If I have a quibble, it's that I would have liked more maps and contemporary illustrations - but that's j

Author Sam Willis writes not only from serious study but from working the tall ships himself. He writes from a practical slant and gleans much from the historical record that a landlubber scholar would never be able to discern. This is very readable with excellent illustrations. A must addition for

Superb deep dive into Naval Warfare in the age of sail. Sam Willis, a well-known maritime historian has put together a series of his research essays into a cohesive and comprehensive story of Naval Warfare during the Napoleonic Wars. Each section of this book focuses on the base components of fleet

The greatest thing about this book is the way it brings practical knowledge of sailing (both the authors and that of period writers) to bear on how naval actions worked at the height of the Age of Sail. I had never suspected just how difficult and time-consuming the manoeuvres that historians casual

Although a fan of Willis' other works, this is not his best ... pedantic and repetitive in the most part. The interesting information about 18th Century war ships (gunnery, sailing attributes, tactics, communications and control, rigging and handling, etc) is overcome by frequent lengthy generalizat

This is a fundamentally important book for anybody who studies the age of sail. It is very well written, and really sets out some of the basic truths about age-of-sail warfare. It doesn't lay out any incredible thought-provoking arguments, but that's not the point. It should be on every naval histor

My background is entirely land-based. I’ve never served in the Navy, nor even sailed a boat, with the exception of a few months in college trying to learn how not to capsize a Sunfish. Nevertheless, ever since discovering in junior high my father’s collection of Hornblower novels, I’ve been a dedica