The Complete Short Stories

(Hardback, Special edition)

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The Complete Short Stories is the most comprehensive collection of OBrians short fiction ever published. An essential volume, certain to enchant OBrian admirers as well as readers who are fortunate enough to be journeying with him for the very first time.
Patrick OBrian is acclaimed as one of the greatest historical novelists of the twentieth century, celebrated throughout the world for his masterful roman fleuve, the Aubrey Maturin series. But he was also a prolific writer of short stories, and it is in this form that he first made his mark.

Encompassing stories written in his unvarnished youth to tales told by a seasoned traveller, this is the most comprehensive collection of OBrians short fiction ever published. It is a treasure chest, overflowing with riches, containing more than sixty tales, including rarities, uncollected works, and forgotten jewels that have been out of print for decades.

These are stories of friendship, travel, adventure and the wonders of the natural world. Some are enchantingly funny, others exciting, terrifying, passionate. All of them prove Patrick OBrian to be a true master of the form.

Reviews

Narrative addicts all have writers to whom they return regularly to cheer or console themselves. Mine are Georgette Heyer, C.S. Forester, Margery Allingham and Dick Francis. I have just discovered another, Patrick OBrian, and he is in many ways better and more satisfying than any of them. A.S. BYATT, EVENING STANDARD

Young writers ought, before lurching into print, to be obliged to learn by heart at least one of Patrick OBrians short stories . . . OBrian writes like a man to whom writing comes as easily as breathing: precisely, fluently, economically . . . perfect cadences. JANE SHILLING, SUNDAY TELEGRAPH

A Kafka in the countryside . . . OBrians accounts of travelling have the clarity of the best descriptive writing . . . The astonishing achievement of these short stories is not just the authors truth to the landscape, but his pitiless vision of the disintegration of personality when a living creature is struggling in a hostile world. ANTHONY EVERITT, COUNTRY LIFE

He is more than a merely popular writer. He is a very, very fine one. CHARLTON HESTON, DAILY TELEGRAPH

It is his ability to develop character, his delightful humour, and the emotion he can evoke, which keep the reader entranced TIMOTHY MO, SPECTATOR

The greatest historical novelist of all time. THE TIMES

There are two types of people in the world: Patrick OBrian fans, and people who havent read him yet. LUCY EYRE, GUARDIAN

Author Bio

Patrick OBrian, until his death in 2000, was one of our greatest contemporary novelists. He is the author of the acclaimed AubreyMaturin tales and the biographer of Joseph Banks and Picasso. He is the author of many other books including Testimonies, and his Collected Short Stories. In 1995 he was the first recipient of the Heywood Hill Prize for a lifetimes contribution to literature. In the same year he was awarded the CBE. In 1997 he received an honorary doctorate of letters from Trinity College, Dublin. He lived for many years in South West France and he died in Dublin in January 2000.