Travel through Britain's military history with a proud seafaring family, the Blackwoods, and the service tradition in which they make their careersthe Royal Marines. Captain Philip Blackwood of the Royal Marines rejoins his ship, the H.M.S. Audacious, in the summer of 1850. Sent out to Africa to eliminate the last strongholds of slavery, then on to the Crimean War."

Captain David Blackwood is embroiled in the Boxer Rebellion. Ordered to escort a beautiful German countess on a dangerous journey up the Hoshun River, Blackwood sees death and slaughter unlike anything he has known. Finally, standing before the walls of Tientsin, he must hold on against a torrent of frenzied Chinese warriors.

It is the turn of young Jonathan Blackwood to take up arms and fight in his country's war, a conflict that has already embroiled all of Europe: World War 1. In 1915, he fights from the sea, supported by the Royal Navy in the battlefields of the Dardanelles and Gallipoli. Two years later in Flanders, Blackwood finds that Hell can get worse.

The Mediterranean, 1943: At long last the British Army has won a victory, and Rommel's Afrika Korps is in retreat. Into this new phase of the war comes Captain Mike Blackwood, Royal Marine Commando. Already bloodied in the disastrous retreat from Burma, Blackwood goes to Alexandria as part of an elite unit, poised to strike the first blows against the Nazi fortress of mainland Europe.

It's 1943, and the seas are haunted by Hitler's deadly U-boats and cruisers. After the mysterious death of the Reliant's last captain, Guy Sherbrooke is given command of the legendary battlecruiser. A symbol of everything the Royal Navy stands for, the battlecruiser boasts the speed of a destroyer and the firepower of a battleship.

This thrilling World War II novel is the latest in Douglas Reeman's epic collection of twentieth-century naval fiction.

With historical authenticity and the novelist's feel for detail, action, and emotion, Reeman brings the story of men at sea alive.

It's 1945 and the war has ended in Europe but the hate and devastation linger on. Lt. Vere Marriott of the Royal Navy and men are moored in Kiel harbor, witness to the disintegration of the once mighty German Navy. For them the fighting's over; now they have a chance to make a tidy profit--and to take bitter revenge.

January, 1970, and the final chapter in the Blackwood history appears to have closed with the murder in Cyprus of Lt. Colonel Mike Blackwood. His son Ross is featured in this last book of the series.

It's the year: 1943. Now there was to be no more retreat for Britain and her Allies. At last the war was to be carried into enemy territory. And, from captured bases and makeshift harbours in North Africa, The Royal Navy's Special Force was to be the probe and the spearhead of the advance.