Not just another pirate!
342255
Awesome story. The author's use of descriptive narrative allows you to hear and smell the sea. And find you looking for a
pirate or two in your thoughts. Easy read, great vocabulary and superb characters. The author puts you in the moment and you
may want to skip lunch in order to read more. I will recommend this author/book to my friends.
1215926
Yo ho, yo ho, a pirate's life for me. I received an ARC of this book thanks to NetGalley/Angry Robot & Strange Chemistry and I'm glad I accepted. The Assassin's Curse was definitely a swashbuckling adventure filled with magic and pirates. Clarke transports you to a whole new world where pirates are actually organized (that's right, Pirates of the Caribbean fans, organized) and make alliances through various methods including marrying off their children. Ananna is the daughter of a well-known pirate on the verge of an arranged marriage with Tarrin, a young man from another pirate family. To Ananna, the marriage would ruin her chances of a life at sea so she runs away. Where do the assassins come in? Well wouldn't you send assassins after the girl who turned her nose up at your son? Despite Naji the assassin's mission, he ends up stuck with Ananna on an adventure across both the desert and sea.

One of the draws of this book is the voice in which it's written in. Ananna and the rest of the cast have a distinct way of talking and thinking to the point that reader could say who is who by the end of the book. Each personality is different while retaining similar values that allow connections to form. Ananna and Naji are from different worlds yet become friends. I especially enjoyed Ananna's character. She isn't afraid to speak her mind and has morals despite having come from a family of pirates. She'll steal and lie when she has to but only if necessary. I also love Naji. He's very loyal to the Order, revealing practically nothing to Ananna, but that's his character and it works.

I'm disappointed I couldn't learn more about the world The Assassin's Curse is set in as it is an alternate world. I would have liked to have more background on both the physical settings but also the culture. This, I think, would have added an extra element to the story, bringing more depth to it. The info dumps at the beginning and end were also slightly annoying. It would've been nice to have that information more spread-out throughout the novel, intermingling with the plot instead of separate.

In the end, The Assassin's Curse is a page-turning adventure sure to sweep you off your feet. I recommend this to all ages, boys, girls, aliens, and whatever species you find yourself. If you love an action-packed adventure filled with suspense and a tiny bit of romance (not enough to really count at this point) then you'll love The Assassin's Curse.
2247437
Great adventure with a cast of characters true to the buccaneers of the Golden Age of Piracy! But you will see a distinct difference between the good and the bad...with a twist! You become fast friends with the lead characters and then the adventure grabs you.  Now on to Book 2 Treasure of Time!
I hope Michael writes book 3 fast!!
942916
Theres something so exciting and fascinating about pirates, am I right? When I think about pirates I instantly go to movies like The Goonies, the Pirates of the Caribbean, and even Peter Pan! The swashbuckling adventures never fail to entertain me on the screen though, besides Peter Pan, I had yet to find something as magical and fun in the pages. Until now!

Right from the get-go I adored our daughter of the pirate king, Alosa. She is a badass pirate, and knows it. She is extremely methodical with every move she makes and is quite the problem-solver, which comes in handy on her newest mission- to be captured by pirates and to steal a treasure map for her father. Daughter of the Pirate King does not hold back on the violence, they are pirates after all, so you can expect some death and fighting. And it is filled with witty banter to lighten it up. The best banter is between Alosa and the first mate, Riden. She could dish out that banter like no other! Flirting and teasing one moment and knocking you over the head the next. They had this great push-pull relationship, a will they or won't they type. And I was absolutely rooting for the will they! The love I have for these sort of relationships! Nothing is easy and nothing is certain but they had so much chemistry and there were definitely some swoony moments between the two.

There are magical elements that come into play as well, and I cant say I was surprised by them but nevertheless found them a welcomed addition that adds a whole new spin on the adventure that awaits us as the series continues. Why 4 stars instead of 5 then? While I appreciated the magical elements that came into play, I felt a couple scenes that used them didn't grab me like I wished and fell flat. And then the novel sort of just ended, abruptly. Dont get me wrong, I did feel like the first chapter of the adventure was coming to an end but the way it wrapped up seemed rushed. Nevertheless, I am thrilled to know a sequel is on the horizon! I cannot wait for more magic, sword-fighting, thieving, and that banter I adored so much! Anyone looking for an adventure should absolutely pick up this quick and exciting read!
4465667
This movie here is a sterling example of how you can make your imagination come alive and create a world of fun, intrigue, surprise and adventure.
We have 7 likeable kids living in a small community with close ties and lots of history and memories.  Coming along to spoil the show, we have a wealthy land developer with his brat of a son as a sidekick who want to raze the town and turn it into a golf resort.
Not willing to be uprooted from their beloved town, the industrious kids (with the help of a found treasure map and a local pirate legend) stumble upon a passage that could possibly lead them to treasure.
Getting to this point was only half the fun.  Now we're really in for a good time!  Enter the danger, adventure and all out pursuit of treasure.  We follow the 7 youngsters through booby traps, dark caverns, perilous near misses, and exciting exploits that is sure to grab the imagination of adults and children alike.  And all this while being chased by 3 bumbling but quite funny counterfeiters who add a great touch to the plot.
Moving right along, while avoiding all the pitfalls that might trip up most people (but not these young Indian Jones proteges), they discover the ultimate prize in the form of a long hidden Pirate ship located in a lagoon enclosed by a mammoth cave.
Upon searching the ship (and dodging more inventive booby traps to boot), the pirates treasure is found which is a means to an end to pay off the land developer to save the town.
Not so fast!  No easy getaway for these bunch of resourceful and rambunctious little ones.  Along comes those dastardly counterfeiters destined to spoil the show.  A little walking the plank, some sword fighting, and a whole lot of fun and the baddies are put out of business.  The exit from the cave is no walk in the park either being that the cave itself was booby trapped (yep, another booby trap and a good one).  With the help of a lovable monster and a whole lot of strength, the kids leave the cavern as fast as you please.
Believing that upon leaving the cavern that the treasure was lost in the lagoon, alas, we have one of the seven heroes who spirited away several gemstones from the Pirate ship that will save the day for the future of the town!
Now, who do we have to thank for this excellent adventure?  Well, let's first look at one of the executive producers.  Steven Spielberg.  Arguably the best movie director who has ever been associated with the silver screen and motion pictures.  Almost every piece of work that Spielberg has ever done has turned to gold and he is a master of exceptional movie making.
Next, we have director Richard Donner who is behind the blockbuster Lethal Weapon movies and many more greats too numerous to list. He has done an excellent job of making a movie that audiences can count on time and again to enthrall them and make them feel great.
This is absolutely 5 stars of fun and excitement all the way and is a sure winner anytime, anywhere.  Highly recommended all around.  Enjoy!
1098115
Goodness me, Helen Hollick can tell a ripping yarn!  Her daredevil pirate/occasionally legal Captain Jesamiah Acorne returns to drive us through a new adventure on the Sea Witch. But its his wife Tiola who holds the power not only within the story, but the one to enthral us in this fast-paced story.

All humanity is there plus some characters who are decidedly not human, yet betray very human fears and hopes. There is death, destruction, secret agents, lost children, devilish opponents, heartbreak, mysterious boxes with a tragic history, and of course the beautiful ship herself. And all this in courtrooms, the Devon countryside, Spain and the high seas.

Go and buy it and set sail for high adventure!
927296
As a huge fan of Pirates of the Caribbean,  I was sold on this book when one of the reviews compared the main character Alosa to a "female Captain Jack Sparrow". Although the beginning of this story was a bit slow, it picked up the pace about 6 chapters in and I was completely hooked. I really enjoyed the character-building and the premise of the story. If you are interested in pirates, adventure,  and a dash of romance that doesn't detract from the main plot, pick up this book! Can't wait until Daughter of the Siren Queen comes out in February... the author definitely did a good job of ending this book with a cliffhanger!
2283862
Like most video game reviews that I write, I make it very clear that I'm not one of those "gamers" that spends 24 hours on a new game to solve it immediately. I play for about an hour at a time, not only to draw out the experience, but to relish the game. Also, as a fairly "older" player (I'm in my 40's), I tend to expect a lot from my gaming experiences (not a big fan of games primarily for little kids). I'm happy to report my complete satisfaction with UBI Soft's new game "Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag".

I first picked up this line of games with Assassin's Creed III. Because of the historical content (I wanted to see the renditions of Boston and other places), I was intrigued, and loved many aspects of the game. One of them was the sea battles that you completed from time to time. It only made sense that the new game capitalized on that aspect. And boy, they did.

You are a pirate, completing missions and ever increasing the strength of your ship as you progress through the game. There are still aspects of the game (the modern day story) that I'm not too fond of, but unlike III, that aspect doesn't confuse or bother me as much.

The sea battles are quite fun and quite stress reducing. Having a bad day? Attack and raid a few ships! As soon as I upgraded my ship the Jack Daw, attacking even the larger ships was fun. Going on raids, discovering buried treasure, and even harpooning sea life all makes for an enjoyable, escapist environment.

I highly recommend this game for casual players like me, just wanting some fun, to those more experienced, who truly want to make the most of the game and environment.
1943429
This is a book that is great for historians and for the pirate lovers in all of us.
2005711
Mr. Batson is not being presumptuous when he compares this book with the&nbsp;<a data-hook="product-link-linked" class="a-link-normal" href="/Pirates-of-the-Caribbean-The-Curse-of-the-Black-Pearl/dp/B0002XL342/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_rvw_txt?ie=UTF8">Pirates of the Caribbean - The Curse of the Black Pearl</a>&nbsp;because the basic ingredients are the same: a pair of young people thrown together by circumstances, a freedom-loving, ship-loving, too-soft-hearted-for-his-own-good pirate captain and his crew of miscreants, another pirate captain and his crew as monstrously evil as any you've ever heard of, a relentlessly pursuing pirate-hunting British commodore chasing hard after them all, and a huge, mysterious treasure.  However, Mr. Batson has shaken these basic elements up considerably and combined them with a twisting, turning, pageturner of a plot that sends our heroes ping-ponging all around the Caribbean before the wild climax at the title location.

Declan Ross is a Scottish-born pirate captain with a host of problems.  First, between a reluctance to kill unless it is truly necessary and a "Never leave a man behind!" policy that would make the USMC stand up and salute, he's just been too soft-hearted to have acquired the pile of loot necessary for him and his understandably extremely loyal crew to retire from piracy as he'd planned.  (Most had gone into piracy in the first place only to avoid starvation after long peace had put so many privateers on the beach.)  Second, his headstrong 16-year-old daughter, Anne, is becoming increasingly vociferous in her demands to be allowed to officially join the crew.  (When after his latest refusal Anne is heard to mutter, "I'd be a better pirate than you are," Captain Ross replies to himself, "That's what I'm afraid of, Anne.  That's what I'm afraid of.")  However, his most pressing problem is that his aging brigantine, the "William Wallace", is running short of rations and leaking so badly that it if it isn't beached, careened, and repaired soon, it is going to sink...

in less than a week.

The trouble is that the only place suitable for their purposes they can possibly reach within that time is a group of cays that just happen to be off limits to them, part of the territory exclusively claimed by a fearsome brutal monster of a pirate and leader of his own fleet: Bartholomew Thorne.

Captain Ross' only possible choice kicks off a cascade of events that soon brings him into contact with Cat, a badly wounded 16-year-old boy of an amnesiac who is somehow involved in all of this but cannot now remember just how, and puts him on the run from both Thorne and the British as he is "commissioned" as it were to recover a legendary lost treasure: the Treasure of the Emperor Constantine... before Thorne does.

I found the going a bit slow to start as the characters were introduced and some seemed a bit too comical to believe, but soon Mr. Batson was running before the wind, and as each chapter ended I raced into the next one.  He keeps the tension wound to the highest pitch, and though he drives his characters by narrowing down their choices, their ultimate decisions make perfect sense for the characters.

The only negative I can think of is the minor nit that the contrast of dark brown letters on light brown pages might be hard on some older eyes, like mine.

Finally, unless you have an allergy to all things Christian approaching that of the Undead (or Madalyn Murray O'Hair), there is nothing to offend in here.  There is little that could be called preaching, and nothing that can be called preachy.  It is just that unlike most popular entertainment Isle of Swords takes place in a universe in which Christianity exists and its existence matters...

thus making it a lot more like the REAL world.

Note: The story continues (and continues well!) here:&nbsp;<a data-hook="product-link-linked" class="a-link-normal" href="/Isle-of-Fire/dp/1400312167/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_rvw_txt?ie=UTF8">Isle of Fire</a>.
2951922
This was the awesome pirate book I didn't know I needed. It takes off like a shot right from the start and doesn't let up until the end. It is a very quick read and entertaining throughout. Alosa is the Daughter of the Pirate King, with all the skills to go along with it, and she is on a mission for her father to steal something from the other pirate lords. For the most part Alosa is a wonderful character to follow around. She is smart, prepared, crafty, and strategic. I very much appreciated how she was tough but still loved nice clothes. Too many books today equate toughness or strength with the character needing to wear a hoody, jeans, and sneakers. Why can't a girl be tough, be okay getting dirty, be an excellent fighter, and still like looking fancy? She is not the most moral, but she's a pirate. She has her own moral code, which for the most part is a good one. She is clever and very cocky about it. It was hard to tell at first how clever she actually was because she is acting a part for a good portion of the book. She started off bragging in her head in the beginning and didn't have actions to back it up. So at the beginning all of her attitude was eye roll worthy. As she did more things throughout the book, the reasons for her self-confidence become much more obvious and by the end of the book I was much more okay with the fact that she was cocky because she has the skills to back it up. There were still a few scenarios that made me think that she wasn't good at thinking on her feet in a moment unless she had practiced that type of scenario before, but for the most part it is fun to follow around someone who is so skilled. I figured out where the map was hidden pretty early in the story, so that wasn't a surprise for me. However, it was an awesome place to hide it, so my guessing correctly didn't detract from the story at all. There is a lot of fun left to be had in this story, and I can't wait to read the rest in the next book.
1917352
What made me purchase this book was the tingle of excitement I got reading the back cover.  I can very well relate to Serenity's disposition, I too love a good pirate adventure and long to be a writer.  I thought the way  Morgan and Serenity were first brought together was supurbly done and very  original.  Kinley has got a real winner on her hands and I look forward to  her future publications.  (I also shared some of the book's jokes with my  husband and had him laughing as much as I was.)  Enjoy this one and get  ready for more!  She is coming out with a book about Jake and hopefully one  about Stanley.
2133378
Hook & Jill, this author's first novel,  was a rollicking story that took the Peter Pan/Wendy/Captain Hook tale and turned it inside out as neatly as a pirate captain removing his velvet coat. Other Oceans ... is even better. Andrea Jones has taken the Hook & Wendy characters (renaming and recreating Wendy into a swashbuckling lass called "Red-Handed Jill) and made them her own. Jill is an amazingly strong woman, and Hook is her worthy equal. But in the second book of the Hook & Jill saga, other characters make their wishes and desires known. The pages practically turn themselves in this exciting tale, and the language is like strong sweet wine. (Plus, the sex scenes are scorching! Whoa!) If you're looking for a tale of adventure and excitement, with description that will make you feel as though you're on a pirate ship yourself, feeling the deck roll beneath your feet and smelling the fresh sea air, give yourself a real treat and pick up Other Oceans. Highly recommended!
3185745
This is a well-written tale of adventure on the high seas.  Edmund Merrick is a reformed man.  He's become a Christian and a privateer.  He still struggles with his old fleshly desires, but truly wants to be the man that God created him to be.  Will he succeed as a Christian and be able to keep his career as a pirate captain?  Charlisse Bristol has escaped her tyrannical uncle's clutches, and is off in search of the father she has never known.  She is rescued by Captain Merrick after being stranded on an island.  He agrees to take her to Port Royal in search of her father.  But when he learns that the man she seeks is none other than Edward the Terror, a ferocious pirate and Merrick's former captain, how will Edmund protect the lady he has grown to love from the pirate he has vowed to bring to justice?

M.L. Tyndall has crafted a very difficult to put down book.  The chapters are short and easy to read.  The chapter titles offer teases as to the contents.  The characters and settings are so real they almost pop off the page!  The Christian theme is woven creatively throughout the story.  I can't wait to read book 2 in the series!
1448735
It was much more than a typical pirate adventure.  It was a first rate political thriller  as well. The five main characters were well developed.  I didn't know how the e book was going to turn out
1001496
Never believing a pirate could come to KNOW the Lord, Marylu Tyndall has brought them to life...in human form!  The characters exhibit the extremes of emotions that are part of life.  To do right or wrong....what are the consequences of either, are what The Pirate Earl and Milady Juilana dealt with, on a daily basis.  By the end of the crisis and redemption of souls - I wasn't ready to put the book down, but alas - until the next one in the series, I'll just have to wait.
962955
Not just your ordinary romance, this book has so much more to it.  It is well written, with interesting and well developed characters that you not only believe in, but actually care about.  The plot is exciting and very well executed and the descriptions are beguiling, hooking you right into the centre of the action. The author has steered clear of the old clich&eacute;s but given the reader everything you could want from a good story, but I think what really makes it so entertaining, is that particularly as a girl, it whips you away on an exotic adventure that is just so much more than the usual romance novels. An excellent and fast paced read which I have no hesitation in recommending highly. Well done!