The empire in question being Napoleon's. Brigadier [in this story, still Lieutenant] Gerard has a supporting role in this adventure story.

Three and a half stars.

Essentially a Dickens novel. Long, full of many dilatory passages that don't really move the plot forward, an orphan, evil guardian, thwarted suitor, sweet innocent heiress, etc.

Goes to show how Dickens actually was good at what he did.

Not too bad a little action/romance in (yes) Napoleonic times, a Brigadier Gerard farce, and a nautical escapade.

Historical action/adventure short stories. Kind of lightweight writing for magazine publication, I guess.

Nowhere near as penetrating or gripping as the Holmes stories, so goes to show why they were the wildly popular ones instead.

Above average, nonetheless.

Very entertaining collection of nautical horror and adventure stories.

Generally, a collection of vignettes having to do with shipping on the Thames in the very last days of sail and early days of steam.

The author was evidently very highly regarded as a prose stylist, but to this reader it's like eating rocks.

Maybe a professor of English literature could better explicate why Tomlinson's oeuvre should be appreciated.

If the first three Fu Manchu novels qualify for a rating of 1, this book is a 2. It's at least twice as readable, but the bar is not set very high.

All along, it seems we will be enjoying a comparatively conventional detective adventure story, but then it ends with a staggering non-conclusion.

Oh, Rohmer.

A bit of a period piece -- somewhat dated, in other words, which is only to be expected. I especially liked the updated (to the 1980s) continuation of the theme from At the Mountains of Madness, where Lovecraft's Antarctic explorers returned with Elder technologies to weaponize in western warfare.

A young man who has been educated at home, more bookish than swordsman, sets off on a journey which will provide him some adventure as a change of pace. Open as he is to whatever circumstance presents, be it a duel, rescue of a fair lady, escape from imprisonment in a sinister chateau, he's kept well occupied.

I like this guy's writing.

Plenty of action, adventure and swordplay in 1600s France.

A little too heavy on the romance, introspection and second-guessing for my taste, but well worth reading overall.