This is book 4 of the "Aubrey-Maturin" series.

This note contains spoilers for the book.

Aubrey gets a multi-ship command. The Admiral over him is grasping and stupid, but for once Aubrey avoids anger and manages to scare the Admiral into almost decent behavior in some regards.

The captains under him are, of course, trouble. Lord Clonfret is fixated on outdoing Aubrey, and has a very ungentlemanly set of officers. And makes strange claims periodically, to the point of sometimes burying his own real capabilities. Another one is a bit brutal and short-sighted, and not a terribly flexible fighting commander. And the French are tolerably good.