Britain is at war with Napoleonic France, and Lieutenant Snowden RN is sent to Bermuda to commission a fast cedar built schooner, Oleander.  In the Mediterranean, the French control the island of Corsica, having defeated the short lived Corsican Republic, and Pasquale Paoli, the Republic's leader, now an old man, is in exile in London.  Snowden and Oleander are sent to Corsica to support a delicate and dangerous operation which could be of considerable assistance in defeating Bonaparte.

In this fast moving, historically accurate and complex novel, the author evokes the era of the Napoleonic wars, set as they were against the background of scientific progress and the nascent Industrial Revolution.