‘Jack Tar’ remains one of our most popular talks, though until we finish our new book on the Great Siege of Gibraltar, we are not booking any more talks. We are, though, looking forward to giving a ‘Jack Tar’ talk (called ‘All at Sea in the Time of the Austens’) at the January 2017 meeting of the Jane Austen Society South-West (on the 28th). This is a very active branch of the Jane Austen Society, and it holds four conferences a year, each one lasting from 10.30am to 3.30pm, with morning coffee, buffet lunch and two talks. They are held in central Exeter (at Southernhay Hall, Dix’s Field, EX1 1QA). This gives you plenty of time to join – for further details, see their website page here (you do not have to be a member of the main Jane Austen Society to join).

We were recently alerted to a well-crafted and generous review of Jack Tar by author and historian Jonathan North. He posted the review on his interesting website that focuses on the French Revolution and Napoleonic history and where he says: ‘But, if I am honest, for me the impact of this age of change on ordinary people was always more compelling, the way in which grand events sweep people up or simply pass them by.’ Those thoughts tie in very much with Jack Tar, for which Jonathan wrote:

‘it is true to say that Jack Tar restores the all-important human dimension, by looking at the experience of life at sea, and relegating talk of mizzens and shoals to an absolute minimum … I learnt a lot, but I have to thank the authors for opening up a whole new world, rich in potential reading … That’s the nice thing about studies relying on personal accounts – they provide an entry point into a new world, and the extracts suggest what your next steps in that world might be. The account of a surgeon in the West Indies, of an admiral off Brest, or a marine in Dalmatia? Yours for the taking. Jack Tar is a great, and entertaining, service to us all.’

There is more on his website here.

In our last newsletter, we mentioned that one of the queries we often receive about our book Jack Tar is ‘How can we purchase the paperback book in the United States?’ We are pleased to say that it is now back in stock on Amazon.com, so buy it now while you see it! The ISBN is 9780349120348.