regshoe

It's not a super shippy novel, but there are some nice moments, yes. In addition to the one you quoted, I'm also fond of 'better than a wife,' and his watching Bush sleep.

Yeah, sometimes other fans go on about what a cinnamon roll Bush is, and I always squint and think of him quick wanting to hang that guy before he 'escapes justice', and shake my head sadly. (And it's not just this one incident; I also think of his weekly flogging of that simple-minded sailor who can't be taught not to spit on the deck; Bush is almost portrayed as simple-minded himself, in that he can't be taught not to flog sailors who can't be taught etc. etc.) I love the guy, but Forester also stuck him with all the less-laudable traits of a Georgian Navy officer in order to use him as a foil for the more enlightened, more-palatable-to-modern-eyes Hornblower, and it shows.

Hornblower and the Countess... *sigh* The 1950s radio adaptation (which is ordinarily very close to the books) has Hornblower turn her down and come back to the ship and write a letter to Barbara about how he misses her, and I much prefer that version. You'll be happy to know, though, that this is the last of Hornblower's inexplicable heterosexual philandering.

(one of whom gets a very sad tragic death) Never get attached to a side character in a Hornblower novel! Just about the time I start thinking that I really like a guy...

I prefer the UK ending of Commodore just because it's such an emotional sledgehammer drop; it's very Forester, to have a professional triumph prefigure a personal disaster. That ending is also a nice launching point for fic -- even to the point that I tend to think of the additional US chapter, with its cloyingly sweet fixit Christmassy ending, as if it were just one more fic. *shrug* But I suppose it might depend on what you imprint upon first; it was a long time before I found out there was a US ending.

It sounds like you're not really in a Hornblower fic place, but I'll go ahead and get my Commodore fic recs up anyway, and you can explore them or not when it suits you.