The king's own - Frederick Marryat

William Seymour grows up on shipboard in the Royal Navy, after his father is hanged during the mutiny at the Nore (1797), and later, he is impressed into the crew of a daring smuggler. This amusing and exciting novel blends in the classic true tale of an English captain who deliberately lost his frigate on a lee shore, in order to wreck a French line-of-battle ship.

Captain Frederick Marryat (1792-1848) was an actual 19th-century British naval hero who lived a saga worthy of the novels of C.S. Forester and Patrick O'Brian. He survived fifty naval battles on the crack frigate Imperieuse under Lord Cochrane-the real-life model for Horatio Hornblower and Jack Aubrey. In addition to plenty of cannonfire, battle strategy, peril, and passion-liberally sprinkled with wit and fine turns of phrase-Marryat's real-life naval experiences lend his novels a truly remarkable authenticity.