Cindy Vallar's Blog - Posts Tagged "smuggling"

Echo in the Wind by Regan Walker

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Unlike many of women of the ton, Lady Joanna West has vowed to never marry, even though at twenty-five, her brother the earl believes it’s high time she wed. She also refuses to stand idly by why the villagers of Chichester starve from lack of work and the inability to pay high taxes. To that end she begins delivering food baskets to the poor, but now oversees the delivery of smuggled tea and brandy and makes sure the goods reach their proper destinations without alerting the revenue agents. One night in April 1784, her men row her out to meet a new partner, a stranger who could be a free trader or a spy.

Captain Jean Donet silently watches from the shadows as his new partner inspects the merchandise and haggles with his quartermaster. Before the Englishman departs, Jean suspects the stranger is actually a woman in disguise. But that possibility intrigues, rather than discourages him, for he, too, is more than he appears to be. Disowned by his father, he is a French spy, was a privateer for Benjamin Franklin during the American Revolution, and is now a successful smuggler with a fleet of vessels. He is also the comte de Saintonge, a title inherited after the untimely death of his father and older brother. He must finally return to the estate he left years ago, but first he must attend several events leading up to the christening of his new grandson.

Since her brother has yet to marry, Joanna serves as his hostess at a party honoring the new prime minister, who is determined to put an end to the smuggling that plagues England. Two other gentlemen in attendance also catch her attention, but for different reasons. One commands the sloop of war responsible for hunting down vessels engaged in this illegal trade. The other is a forty-year-old Frenchman who seems taken with her younger sister, who has just come of age. Joanna will do whatever is necessary to keep Tillie from becoming a sacrificial lamb.

While in London for the christening, Joanna accompanies a friend to the Old Bailey to attend a trial. But the experience leaves her shaken when the smuggler is found guilty and sentenced to hang. Her chosen trade has become too dangerous, so after one last run, she will find another way to help the villagers. Just as she is about to disembark from her partner’s brig, the revenue ship announces her arrival by opening fire and Joanna is badly wounded.

Jean immediately sets sail and, after successfully eluding his pursuers, attends his beautiful guest. Her best chance of survival is to get her as quickly as possible to a French doctor he trusts. But a storm brews in France. King Louis and Queen Marie Antoinette continue to spend money, even though the country is badly in debt. The incident that killed his family may not have been accidental. And his mind wages war with his heart over his growing attraction for Joanna.

Echo in the Wind is the second book in the Donet Trilogy and takes place five years before the storming of the Bastille and the start of the French Revolution. As in the previous title, To Tame the Wind, Walker opens with a list of “Characters of Note” so readers can acquaint themselves with who’s who before the story begins. Aside from Chichester and London, she whisks readers back to eighteenth-century Lorient, Saintonge, and Paris to experience firsthand the discontent of the people and the callow disregard of the nobility. Walker also includes an author’s note where she discusses the history behind the novel.

Chapter one places readers in the midst of the action and shows great promise of suspense, but the pace slows thereafter and doesn’t pick up again until after page 100. Those pages focus more on character development, with only minor hints of possible adventure and misadventure. Yet stalwart readers who brave the trials and tribulations that they and the characters experience will be richly rewarded with a wonderful love story.




View all my reviews

The Pirate's Duty: A SWASHBUCKLING Romance by Katherine Bone

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


It’s only a matter of time. Sooner or later he will come and his price will be high. But Oriana Thorpe doesn’t regret her betrayal. What she regrets is that her dreams won’t come true.

Oriana owns the Marauder’s Roost, an inn that’s been in her family for years. At twenty-three, she has seen more violence and bloodshed than she cares to remember, but she and her brother are the last living members of a smuggling family, who plied their trade with ruthless abandon, off the coast of Cornwall. Her brother, Charles – perhaps the most depraved – will never forgive her for choosing strangers over blood, but she could not allow him to kill two innocent women. She did so to save him, but as far as he’s concerned, Oriana betrayed him and therefore must pay. Until then, his spies watch and wait for his return.

The day Captain Carnage – the alias of Charles Thorpe – kidnapped his sister, Captain Pierce Walsingham’s life changed in ways he never dreamed. It’s 1809 and he is no longer a decorated revenue officer. In fact, he died when his ship sank during a battle with Carnage – at least the majority of Cornwall and his parents believe this to be so. Now, he is the infamous pirate known as the Black Regent, assisting the downtrodden of the local villages. He, too, waits for Carnage’s return. Until that nefarious fiend dies, Pierce’s sister will never be safe – she witnessed his crimes and lived to tell about it. Nor is Oriana safe, and Pierce promised to protect her as well. Two of his men are with her, and once his plan is put bears fruit, he will don another disguise and stay close to her. What he doesn’t know is whether he can trust her. After all, her family operated a successful and brutal smuggling business and he still has not located the gold her brother left at the Roost. While his mind distrusts her, his heart betrays him. No good can come from this mutual attraction. She values honesty above all things, and he’s been telling lies since the day they met.

This third tale in the Regent’s Revenge series focuses on consequences of one’s actions and how the past very much shapes a person. It’s a classical struggle of good versus evil, and Bone pulls no punches in either her description of life in isolated Cornwall when times are tough or its brutality. There are poignant moments that will bring heartache and tears. There are also passionate episodes where hope and the desire for dreams fulfilled never dies. She imbues each character with a mix of good and bad traits, making them human and alive. The Pirate’s Duty shines like sunlight sparkling on a gemstone and is perhaps the best so far in this pirate series.




View all my reviews

The Life of a Smuggler by Helen Hollick

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Smugglers. The word conjures up romantic images, but who were they and is what we know real or fictional? This query is the one Hollick attempts to answer in Life of a Smuggler. She opens by defining the word and explaining the conditions that give rise to these elusive men and women. Chapter one also examines the origins of the word, as well as the terms smugglers used when referring to themselves. She primarily focuses on historical smuggling to the mid 1700s, but also includes tidbits on later periods and present-day operations.

Subsequent chapters answer the main questions of when, why, and who. The main goal of the smuggler is to bring goods of interest to the populace into the country without paying taxes to the government. The first such tariffs (on wine) appeared in tenth-century England. Hollick also looks at other reasons for avoiding these taxes, the risks, the participants, the language of smuggling, and the switch from individuals to organized gangs. Equally important is the chapter on the law and incentives, or the lack thereof, that helped and hindered the revenue men.

After a discussion of the Battle of Sidley Green, readers learn about how smuggling worked, what items were smuggled, and various tricks of the trade. Among the names of individuals whom Hollick mentions is Thomas Jefferson, who participated in smuggling when serving as Minister to France. She also talks about punishments, including amputation, and which came first, the teacup or the teapot.

Four chapters are devoted to where English smugglers plied their trade, dividing the country into the West Country, the South-East, the East Coast, and the countries that comprise the United Kingdom. A fifth chapter looks at smuggling in the New World.

The final chapters address the factuality of inns often referred to as “Smuggler’s Rest”; the punishments smugglers faced if caught; where fictional authors hit the mark and where they don’t in adhering to the facts; how smuggling today differs from that of the past; and why we admire smugglers.

Hollick intersperses “Little Known Facts” throughout the book, although rather than placing these in sidebars, the publisher opted to place these within the main text. This tends to interrupt the flow of the narrative and, at times, these highlights contain the same information as the main text, making for repetitive reading. Black and white photographs are scattered throughout the book, and the book includes a bibliography and further reading list.

Readers seeking more in-depth histories on smuggling would do better to read Richard Platt’s Smuggling in the British Isles, Gavin D. Smith’s The Scottish Smuggler, or Alan L. Karras’s Smuggling: Contraband and Corruption in World History. But those who desire just an enlightening and entertaining introduction to the world and history of the illegal importation of goods will enjoy Hollick’s Life of a Smuggler.




View all my reviews

Battle's Flood by J. D. Davies

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


England in 1555 differs from the one in which Jack Stannard fought the Scots and witnessed the death of his friend aboard the Mary Rose. Henry VIII is dead; his daughter, Mary, sits upon the throne and expects her first child. Her husband is King Philip of Spain, but in spite of the peace between both countries, he has no desire to allow his wife’s people to venture into realms he deems the total domain of Spain, namely the New World and Africa. Not all Englishmen agree with this, chief among them being the Hawkins.

It is also a time when Catholicism once again holds sway, much to the delight of Jack and his daughter, Meg. Love blossoms between her and a young Spaniard whose father is friends with hers. Hope and prosperity give rise to great expectations, but that which is today isn’t necessarily true on the morrow.

The passing of twelve years brings many such changes. The Virgin Queen rules England and has restored the faith of her father to the land, much to Meg’s chagrin. She holds out hope that it is a temporary aberration, one that will change once again when Mary Queen of Scots succeeds her cousin Elizabeth. Jack, on the other hand, and his eldest son Tom are involved in the business of smuggling arms to France, where Protestant Huguenots are stockpiling arms for the day when the Catholic monarchy allies with Spain to stamp out the heretics. While Tom has been raised mostly in the Protestant church, his father retains many Catholic tendencies, and it is those that come to the attention of Francis Walsingham, the queen’s spymaster.

John Hawkins’s new expedition to Guinea and possibly the Caribbean is purported to be a trading venture into Spanish domains, but it has an ulterior purpose known only to a few. Walsingham wants Jack to accompany the expedition. Although hostilities with Spain are on the distant horizon, England is unprepared to wage war at this time. Therefore, Jack must do whatever he can to keep Hawkins from breaking the fragile peace between the two countries, and to keep a detailed record of everything that happens. Such unfamiliar waters to Jack and Tom require them to hire a skilled, black Portuguese, who is somewhat abrasive at times. But the voyage gets off to a rocky start; foreign ships entering the port fail to salute and a tavern brawl creates animus between Tom and Francis Drake, who one day vows to get revenge. And venturing to strange lands with unfamiliar customs and unknown dangers adds to the perils Jack and Tom face.

Such a journey means a lengthy separation from family and friends, so Jack puts Meg in charge of the family business. She tries to warn him that her stepmother is up to no good, but time prevents him from heeding the warning. Having despised and distrusted her stepmother from the moment they first met, Meg slowly unravels the intrigue and discovers that Jennet is in league with Jack’s most hated enemy. To thwart her stepmother, Meg devises a plan of her own, one that will protect the business, her father, and the secret she guards.

Battle’s Flood is the second title in the Jack Stannard of the Navy Royal trilogy. While the prologue takes place in 1555, the majority of the story takes place between 1567 and 1569. The backdrop for the story is Hawkins’s third voyage to collect slaves in Africa and then sell them to Spanish colonists in the New World. Yet even that one event did not occur in a void, as Davies shows as he deftly weaves the tumultuous European history into this tale in ways that make it easy to understand the intricacies of trying to survive in a world verging on war. He drops you into the midst of a battle or a storm at sea with just enough description that then compels your imagination to vividly fill-in the details. Peaceful interludes are woven into engrossing and sometimes nail-biting action, rife with mutiny, poisoned arrows, tribal warfare, the slave trade, smuggling, cannibalism, love lost, betrayal, enmity, feuds, scheming, regrets, and so much more. Equally compelling is his historical note, not only because he provides the history behind the fiction but also because he addresses inconvenient truths, thorny issues, and his treatment of these in the book. While history books discuss these events and recount the unfortunate circumstances that result in the abandonment of so many, those accounts are often mere words on a page. In Battle’s Flood, Davies brings to life the infamous and the famous, and transports you back to the sixteenth century in a way that makes you feel as if you are there.




View all my reviews

Mutiny On The Rising Sun: A Tragic Tale of Slavery, Smuggling, and Chocolate by Jared Ross Hardesty

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


The Rising Sun peacefully navigated Caribbean waters in June 1743. “Murder! Murder!” The sudden cries rent the air as three mutineers carried out their bloody work. At least seven people died that night. Two survived because of the knowledge they possessed. And chained in the hold, bearing witness to the bloody deeds, were thirteen children and two young men, all enslaved and bound for the slave market in Barbados.

This is far more than a simple trade venture gone awry. As Hardesty recounts the events of that gruesome night – providing insight into what is known and can be hypothesized about the mutineers, the victims, and the witnesses – he reveals details of the smuggling cartel behind the voyage, the miseries of human trafficking, and an insatiable craving for wealth, power, and chocolate. How the mutineers were caught and what happened afterward brings the story to a conclusion.

Newark Jackson, a respected sea captain in Boston, had no idea this would be his final voyage aboard the schooner. Many knew that he owned a store that sold chocolate and that he owned slaves who turned the cacao beans into the popular commodity that people enjoyed; what was less known was that he also smuggled contraband into seaports.

Ferdinand da Costa, Joseph Pereira, and Thomas Lucas carried out the foul deeds. Ship’s mate William Blake and bosun John Shaw survived because of their training and experience, both of which aided them in thwarting the mutineers and bringing them to justice – a justice that was as brutal and horrific as the mutiny itself.

Two appendices cover circumstantial evidence, newspaper reports, and witness testimonies. Maps, advertisements, artwork, ship drawings, and photographs are also included. End notes and an index round out the book.

In his introduction, Hardesty describes this book as a “human history of smuggling.” (4) He deftly shows how and why illicit trade played a role in the lives of all those involved, either firsthand or peripherally. What happened aboard the Rising Sun allows him to show us what drove these colonists to participate in the buying and selling of contraband, and how smuggling could result in the consequences that occurred. The Mutiny of the Rising Sun is an eye-opening examination of capitalism, exploitation, and racism during colonial times that still has repercussions for us today.




View all my reviews

The Lady and the Pirate by Bernadette Rowley

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Lady Esta Aranati, also known as Lady Moonlight, is a masked smuggler who does so to provide for those who work on her estate. She and her crew are on their way home when they are boarded by pirates. The Singing Pirate, alias Samael Delacost, and his Lenweri elves, never leave a prize without plunder and since Lady Moonlight has none, he decides to take her. Lady Star, her younger sister, thwarts that plan with black magic much to Esta’s relief and Samael’s dismay.

Back on the estate, Esta focuses solely on the needs of her mother and those in her family’s care. Her sister thinks it’s high time Esta put herself first, but that goes against her grain unless and until she finds sufficient funds to return the estate into a prosperous venture. One item from a smuggling foray may provide her with that possibility. Inside a chest, she finds a map and an engraved metal rod. With her sister’s help, they decipher the clues and set sail to find the treasure.

But they are not the only ones privy to this secret. Samael overhears some men talking about the treasure, and he and his elves shadow the men’s ship as they shadow Lady Moonlight’s. Before Samael can catch up to them, the scoundrels attack her ship, leave her unconscious, and attempt to abscond with the map and rod. He arrives in time to take both from the pirates, and save her and her crew from their sinking ship. After some finagling, they come to an arrangement and set off together to find the treasure. The venture doesn’t quite work out as planned, and Esta returns home with nothing; her sister is harmed and seeks help from her mentor, also skilled in black magic; and Samael goes home to visit his parents.

Except the reunion is anything but joyous. Instead, he discovers that he is adopted, which explains why he’s always felt like an outcast. Compelled to seek out the woman who abandoned him, he attends the queen’s ball where he runs into the masked lady who has haunted his thoughts ever since he boarded her vessel.

Without a ship, Esta’s only path forward is to find a suitable and wealthy husband. That man cannot be Samael. After all, he is a pirate and the king’s admiral is determined to bring him to justice. Still, she helps him in his quest to find his mother. The truth proves more harmful than either expects for them both.

This sixth title in the Queenmakers Saga is a delightful fantasy romance laced with piracy. Some encounters are for adults only, and promised tension doesn’t always reach the level that readers expect. Still, the heart wants what it cannot have and secrets revealed sometimes open unexpected doors. The Lady and the Pirate is a fast read and a welcome diversion from everyday life.


(This review originally appeared at Pirates & Privateers: http://www.cindyvallar.com/adult-fant...)



View all my reviews

Treachery by Julian Stockwin by Julian Stockwin

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Neither Kydd nor Renzi are in good places when this latest Kydd Sea Adventure begins. Renzi suffers from guilt for abandoning his friend when he needed him most. Kydd wallows in grief at the sudden loss of his beloved. Renzi makes a new vow to help Kydd, but it takes an encounter with footpads and the press gang to draw Kydd sufficiently out of his anguish to at least do his duty as captain of Teazer.

This Thomas Kydd is not the one that his men admire and willingly follow. This is a harsh, unyielding commander who demands immediate obedience. As a result, unease and possible mutiny ripple through the crew, though Kydd is too blinded to see or listen to Renzi’s warnings. It takes another to turn the tide before it’s too late.

Teazer and her crew have been relegated to the isolated station of the Channel Islands, where Admiral Saumarez is in charge. For Renzi, this provides him with new opportunities to continue his research. For Kydd, he is given a chance to show his mettle; Saumerez judges by deeds and courage instead of hearsay and innuendo. Kydd accepts the chance to prove himself worth; in doing so, he draws the ire of those who have been on station longer than he has. Then Kydd receives secret orders, which he successfully carries out. Upon returning to home port, his ship is boarded and he is accused of smuggling, which is against Admiralty rules. And the admiral denies ever giving him secret orders.

Treachery is the tale of what happens when an officer loses his command and must seek employment on land. It is also about backstabbing and vowing to clear one’s name, as well as following paths that go against one’s beliefs. Privateering and espionage play key roles in these struggles. The machinations behind a plot to kidnap Napoleon Bonaparte show the tenuous scheming between the English government, French émigrés, and French royalists. The action is riveting and the emotions are profound. Internal struggles play out alongside external ones. This ninth title in the series is one that fans will enjoy not only for these reasons but also because it delves further into multi-dimensions of character.


This review was originally published at Pirates and Privateers (http://www.cindyvallar.com/Stockwin.h...)




View all my reviews