Sean Russell, author of The Swans’ War series among other fantasy novels, has begun to turn his hand to historical fiction under the name S. Thomas Russell. His first outing is Under Enemy Colors, a tale of the Royal Navy in the age of sail.

The tale begins shortly after the French Revolution has devolved into a Reign of Terror. The protagonist, Charles Saunders Hayden, is a lieutenant in the Royal Navy. Born of an Englishman and his French wife, Hayden was raised in both England and France and speaks both languages as native tongues. He was in Paris in the days of the revolution, and supported it with joy…until he saw the mob chasing down and killing men guilty only of the slightest rumor of wrong-doing.

Hayden’s English father is long dead; he has no patron; and so his naval career is stalled. Given his skills and accomplishments (he is, of course, a consummate seaman) he should be made a captain; instead, he is offered a position as First Lieutenant to the incompetent, wrathful, and cowardly Captain Hart, whose crew is on the verge of mutiny.

All of this is familiar territory. The question is, how does Russell stack up against those who have ploughed the same stretch of water?

The plot is perhaps somewhat hackneyed: incompetent and detested captain, check, competent and admired subordinate, check, surly, dissatisfied crew, check, the Rights of Man, check, mutiny, check, heroic deeds, check, court martial, check, vindication, check; given the premise, it could hardly go any other way. When one sits down to a book of this kind, one knows what one is getting. But not all sea voyages from hither-to-yon are created equal, and it’s the scenery and incident along the way that make the trip.

On the whole, I have to say that I think he’s a better writer than C.S. Forester. Hayden strikes me as a more complex character than Horatio Hornblower; with his mixed parentage he is indeed a kind of composition of Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin. He’s also better, I think, than Alexander Kent, author of the Bolitho series. On the other hand, he’s not Patrick O’Brian…but no one is, so that’s hardly surprising. (NB: I read O’Brian before I read Forester; perhaps if I’d read them in the other order I’d have a higher regard for Forester. As it is, I found him lacking.)

The second book in the series, A Battle Won, is due to be released in hardcover this August. I’m looking forward to reading it, though probably not until it comes out in paperback.