Alan Lewrie

Alan Lewrie is the hero and main character of Dewey Lambdin's naval adventure series of novels.

In the first book, Alan Lewrie is little more than an educated, fun-loving Londoner who spends his time gambling, drinking, and in the company of the occasional lady. Suddenly he is thrown in to a world with rules he knows nothing about.

With the help of friends, mentors, enemies, villains, and the mention of a god or two, Alan quickly rises through the ranks of the Royal Navy. He becomes the captain of his own ship and sails off to many subsequent adventures.

While the idea of a multi-colume series of a British naval officer in the late 18th Century and through the Napoleonic Wars is hardly new ground for novelists; Lambdin's series is much more bawdy than C.S. Forester would have dared contemplate for his Hornblower series. Unlike other series, Alan Lewrie doesn't quite express himself in the manner of the times, though Lambdin throws in a lot of period slang, sometimes reaching before or after the times that Lewrie is active.

Lewrie's attraction is a series of continual struggles -- at first glance, we find him in January 1780 abed with his half-sister by adoption as part of a thin plot by his father to get his 17 year old bastard son out to sea (and thereby to acquire access to the estate of a grandmother that Lewrie knows nothing of). Throughout the first novel, "The King's Coat", Lewrie tries to adapt his his unwelcome new life as a midshipman in the Royal Navy, and eventually finds that he does have some talent for it.

In "The French Admiral", Lewrie is involved in the 1781 campaign around Yorktown and learns that he has an aptitude for warfare. He also first meets the family of his future wife, Carolina Loyalists fighting against the Rebel Americans. (It is unusual to find an American author setting a hero among Loyalists). In a bit of a contrived plot device, his father's machinations are undone.

In the last year of the American Revolutionary War, Lewrie is promoted to Lieutenant in "The King's Commission", and enjoys another series of adventures and amours. Unusually for a young officer, Lewrie gains a nickname -- "Ram-Cat", which is not just for his choice of pets.

With the start of the peace, Lewrie is fortunate to find(in "The King's Privateer") naval employment in the Far East aboard a clandestine Royal Navy mission against pirates in the South China Sea. This novel has Lewrie gaining his first contacts with a very unusual set of British secret agents (of a sort that definitely didn't exist until the 20th Century), and first crossing swords with an occasional future adversary, the demonic Guilliame Choundas of the French Navy. He also connects again with his father, now pursuing life as an officer in the The East India Company.

As a reward for his service in the Far East, Lewrie is given command of a small vessel and dispatched once more to the Caribbean in "The Bomb Ketch"; he also marries Caroline Chiswick. This time, his bawdy adventures are largely restricted to his new wife.

Following several years of peaceful life as a well-off tenant farmer in England with three children, Lewrie is called to arms once more as the Napoleonic Wars begin with France. This adventure ("HMS Cockrel") takes him through the Impress Service, life as a first Lieutenant aboard a Frigate, and to the siege of Toulon. Lambdin now takes to giving Lewrie the chance to meet more famous characters from history, including Napoleon Bonaparte,Emma Hamilton, the King of Naples, and sundry of Britain's more famous admirals including then-captain Horatio Nelson.

Following his escape from Toulon, Lewrie's next adventures are continued in "A King's Commander", where Lewrie is promoted to that rank and given a proper ship (HMS Jester) of his own to command. More sex ashore, and whenever things are lagging in the plot (involving British agents and Choundas once more), there's always a battle to fight. A new element of neo-paganism is introduced into the series as Lewrie begins to encounter strange signs and omens often involving seals.

"HMS Jester" takes Lewrie into the Adriatic in 1796 just as Napoleon is overruning northern Italy. The main action in this book concerns Serbian Pirates and some ghastly atrocities that Lewrie is forced to watch. Unusually for Lambdin, Lewrie remains celebate in this novel until a brief encounter in the last few pages.

"King's Captain" sees Lewrie promoted again and given command of a brand new frigate... which he boards on the eve of the Nore Mutiny. In "Sea of Gray", Lewrie's domestic life disintegrates as Caroline learns of his many infidelities, courtesy of anonymous letters that seem distressingly well-informed about the 'Ram-Cat's' philanderings. In the meantime, he and his frigate "HMS Proteus" are dispatched to the Caribbean once more. While coping with the aftermath of an outbreak of Yellow Fever in his crew, Lewrie conspires with an old friend (Kit Cashman, who he first encounters in 1782) to accept a dozen runaway slaves from Jamaica in his crew.

In "Havoc's Sword", Lewrie and HMS Proteus are still in the Caribbean, where he gets to confront Choundas yet again and to cooperate with the rising US Navy. The same arena is still in play for "The Captain's Vengeance", where Lewrie embarks on a secret mission to the Spanish port of New Orleans to deal with French Acadian pirates... and finds that one of them is a very attractive and astonishingly liberated young woman.

With "A King's Trade", Lewrie is in deep trouble once more as the conversion of some black slaves to Royal Navy seamen comes back to haunt him. Legal action beckons, forcing Lewrie into the arms of William Wilberforce and the Abolitionist movement. In the meantime, Lewrie must escort a trade convoy to South Africa, developing a -- so far -- chaste relationship with a young Russian woman and a ferocious encounter with a marauding French frigate.

The 14th Lewrie book takes things to the spring of 1800, where Lewrie is back in England as a wealthy hero following his cruises with HMS Proteus; but a date in court for the theft of slaves awaits. His attempted reconcilment with Caroline goes off the rails, following the arrival of another anonymous letter.

Given the chance, Lewrie is lazy, casual, and inclined to be good humoured and amusing -- a 'Merry Andrew' in the parliance of the day. However, what was initially a facade as an active and conscientious naval officer has actually become real over the course of the novels. Lewrie becomes an imaginative and aggressive officer, a capable leader, and a competent seaman... He is no longer dominated by his womanizing. He is also lucky, and encourages the belief among the more superstitious of his seaman, that he is under the favor of the ancient God of the Sea, Lir. At times, he almost believes this himself.

Lambdin has an interesting character here, and while the Peace of Amiens is lurking in Lewrie's near future; the resumption of the war and another 12 years of fighting await. Choundas remains alive; there are children (legitimate and otherwise) to be seen to; a growing sexual frustration as Alan has been celibate since his piratess in New Orleans; and his legal troubles still aren't over.