The Yellow Admiral — Patrick O'Brian

Life ashore may once again be the undoing of Captain Jack Aubrey of the Royal Navy, in Patrick O'Brian's long-awaited sequel to his bestseller The Commodore. It is 1814; with the coming of peace and for several other reasons his future at the admiralty dim, Aubrey fears being "yellowed"--nominally promoted to the rank of admiral without a squadron to command. But no sooner has his fellow adventurer Dr. Stephen Maturin turned up with a prospective mission than Aubrey receives an urgent dispatch ordering him to Gibralter: Napoleon has escaped from Elba.