Set on a former British man-of-war transporting migrants to Australia in the early 19th century, the novels explore themes of class and man's reversion to savagery when isolated, in this case, the closed society of the ship's passengers and crew.
The trilogy as a whole was adapted by the late Leigh Jackson and Tony Basgallop for a 2005 BBC drama mini-series of the same name, directed by David Attwood and starring Benedict Cumberbatch.
Talbot begins by describing the passengers of all classes (getting a tour of the ship) and crew members, who encompass a motley yet representative collection of early 19th-century English society.
When one of the crew suggests officers were involved, the captain ends his investigation of Colley's death, as "buggery" (homosexual intercourse) is punishable by hanging.
Fire Down Below (1989) closed the trilogy with a description of the ever-more perilous voyage (given the old ship and old charts); of Talbot's maturing and his growing admiration for the Prettimans, a married couple; of the rivalry between the two principal officers, Summers and Benét, for Captain Anderson's respect and trust; and of the conclusion to Edmund's affaire de coeur with Miss Chumley.
In the ship society of Rites of Passage, passengers and crew members are subject to (mutually acknowledged) gradations of status based on their social standing (position or trade, education, speech and manners, etc.)
The leitmotiv of proper gentlemanly conduct is explored in the friendship of Talbot with Lieutenant Summers, who presses him to live up to his responsibilities as an aristocrat after he has taken advantage of his privileges.