Captain Blood

by Rafael Sabatini

I enjoyed this book immensely. This was written in a classic style, so it did take a few pages to get caught up in the prose and the storytelling, but once I did, I was off for an adventure. Someone who does not know what this book is about may be concerned by the title. Fear not, for at the beginning of this book we meet a young doctor named Peter Blood. This is his story, and what a story he is. How unfortunate circumstances find him bound from his home in England to the South Seas and the New World as a slave. This book actually sheds a lot of light on why many of the pirates of old probably became pirates. And I couldn't help but think of Johnny Depp and Pirates of the Caribbean when I read this book. And I am positive that when he was studying his character for pirates, Johnny familiarized himself with Captain Blood. Because this was a pirate to root for, I wanted him to succeed every step of the way, and at every junction things would run amok and not work out quite the way I expected.

Because of the unexpected turns of events over and over, the ending was also unexpected, and left me smiling and wishing there were just a little more to the story. Fortunately for me, if I wanted to continue on, Rafael Sabatini wrote several more adventures about Peter Blood after the success of his first one. There are also once-successful movies in circulation starring Errol Flynn. And while I won't run out and buy a copy, I will keep an eye out for them to appear on TCM or another classic movie channel some day. I can definitely recommend Captain Blood if you're looking for a swashbuckling adventure, because it's pirates in and out, and just wonderful. Every page is inviting and the writing is beautifully done. A perfect book for cozying in front of the fireplace.