The Command of the Ocean

I have never reviewed a book that has given me more pleasure … a masterpiece

Kevin Myers, Mail on Sunday

A great work of history … A truly satisfying book that one puts down with regret … Nothing written during the past century, perhaps ever, approaches N. A. M. Rodger’s ambitious and masterly three-volume Naval History of Britain … it is likely to be regarded as one of the greatest works of historical scholarship of our age

Paul Kennedy, The Sunday Times

Magisterial … triumphantly succeeds in moving the Royal Navy back to centre-stage in our islands’ story

Andrew Roberts, Sunday Telegraph

Stunning … By the time the book closes there is no doubt who holds command

Simon Heffer, Literary Review

Quite outstanding

Sir Michael Howard, The Times Literary Supplement, Books of the Year

Monumental … Rodger is our finest naval historian

Saul David, Daily Telegraph

Exciting and original … Here is that rarest of all historians, the expert with the generalist’s approach

Geoffrey Moorhouse, Guardian

Truly in a class of its own … at turns witty, provocative and incisive … you finish it wishing for more

F. J. M. Scott, History Today

Scholarly and erudite, but also a thrilling story, told with wit and verve

Economist, Books of the Year

Splendid … There is plenty of old-fashioned narrative in this encyclopaedic blockbuster … the writing advances across the pages like a squadron of dreadnoughts

John Parfitt, Spectator

An enterprise of truly stupendous scope and erudition … Even the annotated bibliography, with its deadpan, often savage comments, is a pleasure to read

Brendan Simms, Evening Standard

N. A. M. Rodger is the doyen of naval scholars … This is an excellent book

Frank McLynn, New Statesman