King, Ship and Sword

McBooks Press Inc has announced that the next book in the series will be King, Ship and Sword, available early 2010

Speaking of McBooks Press, their newsletter arrived via email today. I assume that's where Astrodene got the tidbit about KS&S. If you don't get this newsletter, you should! Go to their website ( http://www.mcbooks.com/ ) and subscribe. The latest number features interviews with Dewey Lamdin and David Donachie. Best of all is the photo of Douglas Reeman with (as in all his dust jacket pix) a big pipe clamped in his jaw. (A billiard blast, I'd guess a Dunhill.) The brotherhood of briar lives!

This novel (due out in March 2010) is listed on Amazon for pre-order although no cover picture or description so not added to the site yet.

Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.com

The description for this book is now available so it has been added to the website

This sixteenth adventure of Alan "Ram-Cat" Lewrie begins & ends at sea, but most of the action takes place on land. The cessation of war following the Peace of Amiens results in Lewrie journeying to Paris where folderal and mayhem ensue. So it is not surprising that he encounters characters from prior adventures - - Phoebe Aretino, Charite de Guilleri, Guillame Choundas, and the Coriscan Ogre himself.

While this adventure resolves some issues in Lewrie's personal life, it of course creates others. I can't wait for the next installment by author Dewey Lambdin!

The paperback version will be released on 4 January 2011. More info on the web site here

I have been a faithful admirer of this series. I have read them all at least twice but I was really upset with the turn of events

Spoiler:

when Lewrie's wife Caroline was killed

. It changed the entire mood of the stories from relatively light hearted to highly emotional. It was as if Arthur Conan Doyle had killed off Watson in one of his Sherlock Holmes stories.

Spoiler:

She was a major character in the series and it remains to be seen if it will be as good without her.

Edited by Astrodene to insert spoiler tags

Good point, SequelSailor.

Hi SequelSailor and welcome.
Yes I remember feeling the same way when I finished this one, wondering if I would continue with it when the next one came out. But I did: The Invasion Year is a good follow-up, but nothing in it convinces me that the event that upset us both was really necessary to the furtherance of the story. Time will tell.

Spoiler:

I don't think her death was a big deal. She wasn't a major character in the series anyway. Much Like Diana Villiers and Barret Bonden, their spectacular deaths quickly became secondary albeit much discussed. Maybe in the next book (after The Invasion Year) it will, considering the Louisiana gal, but I doubt it. I suspect it was just a plot device to get Cap'n Lewrie some legitamite "strange".

.
Only time will tell.

I think that I'm going to go against the grain with this one. I actually really enjoyed it. It may not have been the saltiest of sea stories, but it was a rollicking good tale of adventure in the grand old style! It felt more like a Sabatini swashbuckler than a Forester AoS, but that is not necessarily a bad thing.

Spoiler:

The death of Caroline did, however, feel more to me as if Lambdin had written himself into a corner with that character and relationship and simply took the easy way out. I felt it was perfunctory and lacked impact.

I certainly enjoyed it more than, say, The French Admiral and have to give Lambdin credit: in France and yet he resisted the urge to ramble on for page after page in bad Pythonesque French accents!