Set during the American Revolution, A Matter of Honor is the first book in The Cutler Family Chronicles, a series by William C. Hammond III. I've read extensively in the genre of nautical fiction, but Hammond was new to me, so I was eager to give this new series a try.

It's very good. It's not great, and certainly doesn't rise to the top of the field with the likes of O'Brian, Forester, Pope and Kent, but the novel is enjoyable, action-packed and full of historical tidbits as young Richard Cutler of Massachusetts fights for the fledgling republic and meets luminaries of the day including John Paul Jones, Benjamin Franklin, Horatio Nelson and the Marquis de Lafayette.

While it's improbable that any one person would be in so many places of historic significance and meet so many prominent figures, a certain suspension of disbelief always helps make a book like this more palatable. In Hammond's case, it never rose to the level of unbelievability, and it was fun peeking in on so much history in the making.

Cutler, whose hatred for England stems from his brother's death after being pressed onto a British naval vessel, acquits himself well in the new American navy, and he's a likable protagonist who is certainly good at whatever task he faces. He's embroiled in international diplomacy as much as he is naval combat, but the book rarely drags.

And be prepared to move around a lot as you follow Cutler's adventures, which take him up and down the American coast, across the ocean to England, Ireland and France, and down to several Caribbean islands.

The book should have come with a French phrasebook, since there are a few too many untranslated bits of dialogue that require more than context to understand. My only other big complaint is the book's description on the back cover, which lays out the entire plot from beginning to end.

There are a few minor hitches in the novel, including several abrupt jumps forward and backward in time to fill in the gaps in Cutler's personal history. There is also perhaps an overabundance of romance for our American hero, who wins the hearts of women in England and France, both of whom have ties to some very important people. The narrative certainly slows down quite a bit during Cutler's lengthy Caribbean honeymoon, and at some point along the way, Hammond apparently decided the book was lacking in sex, and a few of the subsequent scenes feel unnecessary.

But I like the book overall. While I didn't catch the series in its initial printing by Cumberland House, I look forward to reading the reissued volumes by McBooks; the company has a knack for picking up excellent nautical fiction that might otherwise be overlooked by U.S. readers.