It features the characters of Captain Jack Aubrey and naval surgeon Stephen Maturin, and is set in the early 19th century during the Napoleonic Wars.

During the brief Peace of Amiens, Aubrey and Maturin live in a country house in England, where they meet women with whom they fall in love.

Then their lives are turned upside down when Aubrey loses his money due to decisions of the prize court and a dishonest prize-agent.

When the war begins afresh, Aubrey has a command aboard HMS Polychrest, gaining fewer prizes yet succeeding in his military goals.

[2] Author Mary Renault gave the novel high praise,[3] while Alison Sulentic commended it for the two different ways that Maturin and Aubrey "come to know wisdom" as a result of falling in love.

[4] With the Peace of Amiens, Jack Aubrey returns to England and rents a house with Stephen Maturin, with shipmates running the household, and the friends spending their time fox hunting.

His fortune disappears when his prize-agent absconds with his funds and the prize court finds that two merchant ships he had captured were owned by neutral nations.

Jack also dallies with Diana, straining his friendship with Stephen and showing himself indecisive on land, in contrast to his decisive ways at sea.

In Toulon to visit Christy Pallière, the French captain who had captured Aubrey's first command Sophie before the peace, they learn that a renewal of the war is imminent.

They reach Gibraltar, where Jack and Stephen take passage aboard a merchant ship of the British East India Company, the Lord Nelson.

Polychrest is an oddly designed ship that was purpose-built as an experimental weapon, though the project is now abandoned and the Admiralty has tried to refit her for ordinary service.

Jack rues his angry words with Stephen, and then quashes the mutiny by putting the instigators and some loyal crew in a ship's boat and quickly beginning the attack.

Returning from Spain, Maturin tells the head of naval intelligence, Sir Joseph Blaine, that the Spanish will formally enter the war in alliance with France as soon as four ships full of bullion from Montevideo arrive safely in Cadiz.

Maturin takes no pay for his intelligence work but does ask a favour: that Lively be included in the squadron sent to intercept the Spanish treasure fleet.

The novel posits that Melville could not properly defend himself because the funds in question were associated with the secret appropriations for intelligence gathering while he was Treasurer in the Admiralty.

[8] This references similar controversy which had arisen during the period about the true authorship of James Macpherson's translation of his epic cycle, and continues to be questioned today in literary circles.

W W Norton issued a reprint in the USA 18 years after the initial publication as part of its reissue in paperback of all the novels in the series prior to 1991.

Last year, however, W. W. Norton decided to reissue the series in its entirety, and so far nine of the 14 have appeared here, including the most recent chapter, The Nutmeg of Consolation.

[3]Library Journal found this to be a "rich blend of adventure, romance, and intrigue", reviewing an audiobook version read by John Lee[12] and "Recommended for most collections.

"[13] Frank Prial wrote about Post Captain, in an article in The New York Times about the author in 1998, that "The Aubrey-Maturin series has been said to rival the sequential novels of Trollope and Anthony Powell.

The second book of the series, Post Captain, set mostly in country houses and as much a novel of manners as a sea story, has been said to be Mr. O'Brian's homage to Ms.

"[14] The intricate interweaving of plot lines that trace the personal and professional fortunes of the main characters crosses many of the more traditional categorizations of popular fiction.

[4] In a more recent review, author Jo Walton finds this the book in the series with the poorest plot structure ("broken-backed") though complimenting the characters and incidents.