Writing in 2013, the author Nicola Griffith professed herself smitten: "In these books every reader who loves fiction both intellectually and viscerally will find something to treasure – and every writer something to envy. They will sweep you away and return you delighted, increased and stunned". She noted that while many reviewers have compared O'Brian to C S Forester, such comparisons are 'nonsense' – "This is Jane Austen on a ship of war, with the humanity, joy and pathos of Shakespeare".