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Rating: 
Summary: Sharpe's Trafalgar
Review: Bernard Cornwell and his Richard Sharpe series are some of the most exciting historical fiction around. There are quite a few people reviewing this book and suggesting works Patrick O'Brien, especially if interested in nautical fiction. I would also like to include anything by James L. Nelson. He writes nautical fiction with battle scenes and stories that suck you in at the same level of the Sharpe books.
Rating: 
Summary: Sharpe the Marine.
Review: Bernard Cornwell is a historian first and storywriter second, at both he is superb. Trafalgar is possibly the most famous naval battle in British history and it just so happens to fit in with the Sharpe timeline. Naturally as a historian Cornwell would want to put Sharpe in this position and am glad he did. I found this book to amazingly interesting. The account of the naval battle is both detailed and gripping. He recounts the events with such accuracy its amazing how he made it seem so interesting and not just a report from a history book.The book has all the ingredients that make the Sharpe series so great, you just have to read it to love it. I give this book 4 stars, and it's well deserved.
Rating:
Summary: Sharpe the Marine.
Review: Bernard Cornwell is a historian first and storywriter second, at both he is superb. Trafalgar is possibly the most famous naval battle in British history and it just so happens to fit in with the Sharpe timeline. Naturally as a historian Cornwell would want to put Sharpe in this position and am glad he did. I found this book to amazingly interesting. The account of the naval battle is both detailed and gripping. He recounts the events with such accuracy its amazing how he made it seem so interesting and not just a report from a history book. The book has all the ingredients that make the Sharpe series so great, you just have to read it to love it. I give this book 4 stars, and it's well deserved.
Rating: 
Summary: Not his best
Review: I dont enjoy reading books out of historical sequence, and I think BC struggles to find Sharpes Sea legs on this one - still a great read but not as enjoyable as the land based Sharpe's with his riflemen. I think BC tried too hard to simply get the Battle of Trafalgar as one of the stories in his series. But if you are a BC fan you will still enjoy.
Rating:
Summary: Not as good as the other Sharpe novels
Review: I was somewhat disappointed in this book. I always look forward eagerly to another in the Sharpe series, but this one was not one of Cornwell's better efforts, in my opinion. Still worth reading for we diehard Sharpe fans, however. Sharpe is on board ship and gets involved with a married woman. She and her husband are gentry but of course, she falls for Sharpe's good looks and rough demeanor. I found this a little hard to believe, especially taking place aboard ship with little opportunity for quiet and intimate meetings to develop the relationship. In the end, Sharpe has to handle the complications of keeping his affair a secret, and oh yes, the Battle of Trafalgar intervenes. Actually, the battle scene is handled well as is typical for Cornwell. Possibly I was disappointed with this book because I was reading the Richard Woodman "Nathaniel Drinkwater" naval warfare series around the same time. Maybe the naval setting was not the best milieu for Sharpe's (and Cornwell's) abilities. If you haven't tried the Sharpe books, I highly recommend you pick up _Sharpe's Rifles_ without delay.
Rating:
Summary: A cheeky installment from Mr Cornwell
Review: Richard Sharpe, the heroic rifleman, was created by Bernard Cornwell as a way of following the career of the Duke of Wellington in the Peninsular war. When that proved a roaring success Cornwell embarked on the production of some Prequels to show how Sharpe had risen from the ranks in India, and to show the early career of Wellesley at Seringapatam and Assaye. But Sharpe had to be moved from India to Spain, and Cornwell cheekily hijacked this opportunity to introduce his diamond in the rough to the other great British war hero of the Napoleonic era, Admiral Nelson. In the process Cornwell slips another ship of the line into the battle of Trafalgar on either side. Sharpes Trafalgar is a great swashbuckling novel in the best tradition of Hornblower. It moves from Conmen in India to Pirates on the high seas. There follows a nailbiting sea chase between two 74 gunners, culminating in the Battle of Trafalgar. Along the way is a love story, deception, blackmail and revenge, all the usual depth and richness of Cornwells back plots. And on the trip we learn a lot about the day to day routines of the great days of sail. Wonderful and colourful stuff. It's not literature, but it is great!
Rating:
Summary: Cornwell' weakest link in the Sharpe series.
Review: The year is 1805 and Ensign Richard Sharpe is preparing to return to England in order to join the newly formed 95th Rifle Regiment. In the course of his preparations , he encounters Captain Joel Chase of HMS Pucelle at the home of a slimy Indian merchant who is attempting to cheat the two officers. The two officers become friends in spite of the vast disparity in rank , and their fortunes are intertwined in the course of this somewhat contrived tale. Sharpe sails on the East India Company's ship Calliope , has an affair with the lovely young wife of an aristocratic English lord , encounters Anthony Pohlmann (who we remember from "Sharpe's Triumph" as the leader of the Mahratta confederation armies) , and falls prey to a French warship , the Revenant. In order for Sharpe to be present at Trafalgar , Cornwell has the Calliope recaptured by Joel Chase and the Pucelle and young Sharpe joins in the sea chase for the Revenant which culminates at the battle of Trafalgar. The saving grace of the entire tale is Cornwell's description of the epic battle at sea! Even tho' some of the other writing is not up to the standard we expect from the author , it is more than compensated by the battle scene. I personally believe this novel to be a bit of a "fill-in" novel in order to get Sharpe to another theater of activity. Not one of my favorites in the series , but still three stars-plus.
Rating:
Summary: Sharpe's Trafalgar
Review: This book centers around how Richard Sharpe left India and eventually found himself in the middle of the Battle of Trafalgar, the most defining naval battle during the Napoleonic Wars. The book is predictable though, the side plot of Sharpe and a prominent female character is filler to an otherwise muindane journey. The author though describes a good picture of how its like to be on a ship two hundred years ago. He describes the parts of a ship pretty well and the sounds and smells of the ship pretty well. The interactions between the characters in the book were pretty predictable, you just knew that the characters would now do anything surprising, the heroes would behave heroic, the aristocrats would behave like snobs, and the cicophants would behave cowardly. Despite it all, the book was pretty enjoyable and would probably be good for younger readers more than older readers. The book reminds me of a hollywood movie that uses a recycled plot with high profile actors. But despite all of the mediocre shortcomings of this particular book, I got out of it a good impression of a slice of life in the 19th century where all the evolution of today's world came.
Rating:
Summary: simplistic plot but good character interactions
Review: This book centers around how Richard Sharpe left India and eventually found himself in the middle of the Battle of Trafalgar, the most defining naval battle during the Napoleonic Wars. The book is predictable though, the side plot of Sharpe and a prominent female character is filler to an otherwise muindane journey. The author though describes a good picture of how its like to be on a ship two hundred years ago. He describes the parts of a ship pretty well and the sounds and smells of the ship pretty well. The interactions between the characters in the book were pretty predictable, you just knew that the characters would now do anything surprising, the heroes would behave heroic, the aristocrats would behave like snobs, and the cicophants would behave cowardly. Despite it all, the book was pretty enjoyable and would probably be good for younger readers more than older readers. The book reminds me of a hollywood movie that uses a recycled plot with high profile actors. But despite all of the mediocre shortcomings of this particular book, I got out of it a good impression of a slice of life in the 19th century where all the evolution of today's world came.
Rating:
Summary: Sharpe at sea
Review: This is the (chronological) fourth book in the Sharpe series. It follows the third immediately, so please start at the beginning if you have not done so. For those of you who have read the previous Sharpe books, review follows.
On his way home to England, Sharpe sails with one Captain Peculiar Cromwell, and meets up with his old cordial enemy, Pohlmann. He also begins an affair with an aristocrat's wife. But traitors have sold the ship to the French, and he is captured. Once Sharpe and the crew are rescued, the hunt is on, which leads them to meet Nelson and fight in the Battle of Trafalgar. This is another very good entry in the series, even though I don't care for nautical fiction as much as I do reading of land battles. As always, the historical details of ships, battles, dress and speech are mostly meticulously rendered, mixed in with a perhaps more modern action-hero sensibility (perhaps some of Sharpe's actions, as a mere ensign, might have been frowned upon in reality). It is true that the characters in this entry are painted in broader strokes than in the previous ones (thus the 3 rather than 4 stars): the heroes are all brave, good and dependable and the villains are all duplicitous and craven. Still, it's a swashbuckling yarn, and great reading fun. Recommended.
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