Review of Savage Winds

Savage Winds by Michelle C. Reilly

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Ana Salvatore, a marine biologist, and her uncle return to his boat after scuba diving off the coast of Grand Bahama only to confront two armed strangers. Born into one of the leading mob families, she has tried hard to distance herself from the unsavory ties that eventually killed her parents, but now they are after her beloved Uncle Louis, who raised her. In the ensuing struggle, an explosion flings Ana into the depths of the Caribbean. When she comes to, she finds herself in a captain’s cabin, although not aboard her uncle’s vessel. This is a ship of wood and sails where the captain has a strange English accent and he and his men wear outfits from the past. At first, she assumes they are re-enactors, but soon discovers that she has traveled back in time to the early nineteenth century.

Jacen Stirling has little time to deal with the beautiful woman whose unfamiliar words and skimpy outfit puzzle him. His country is in the midst of a war with Great Britain, and he must determine whether Jean Laffite’s offer of assistance is real – a pursuit that requires him to infiltrate the pirate enclave at Barataria. To gain Laffite’s trust, Jacen pretends to be a fellow buccaneer and must arrive at the pre-arranged rendezvous before time runs out. Rescuing Ana and having her aboard a ship full of men is a complication he doesn’t need, yet he cannot spare the time to see her safely ashore and still make his appointed destination.

A brief stop at Nassau to take on supplies adds to the urgency of his mission. Amassing in the harbor is a fleet of many Royal Navy ships, most certainly the invasion fleet bound for New Orleans. Jacen assigns Ana the duties of a ship’s surgeon, which leads to some comical situations when twenty-first-century medical practices clash with nineteenth-century proprieties.

Wary of being on her own in a time where she doesn’t belong, Ana insists on going with Jacen when they arrive off the coast of New Orleans. To earn Laffite’s trust, he agrees to do the pirate’s bidding, and to ensure that Jacen obeys, Laffite keeps Ana as collateral. Should Jacen fail, she will be delivered back to his ship . . . dead. In his absence, she ministers to the slaves on a nearby plantation. She also befriends both their children and the master’s rebellious daughter, as well as engaging in risky business of her own – teaching slave children to read.

Savage Winds introduces Reilly’s new series, Savage Times – time-travel romances where heroes and heroines forge bonds while confronting dangerous situations in unaccustomed surroundings and historical periods. Her intriguing portrayal of Jean Laffite combines dangerous and deadly with charismatic and courteous, differing from the usual impression of the descriptor “gentleman pirate.” She also adheres to the belief that Dominique You was one of the Laffite brothers, although the Jean Laffite journal and Stanley Arthur Clisby’s biography state that You was the oldest, rather than the youngest, of them. There are several historical inaccuracies. Tricorn hats were not part of American military uniforms of this period; holystones – used to scrub the decks of wooden ships – were blocks of sandstone, rather than bristle brushes; and in 1814, William Claiborne was governor of the state of Louisiana, not the territorial governor.

For the most part, these are minor slips when examined from the perspective of the entire story. Ana’s unfamiliarity with society and history provides both comic relief and grim awakenings between the world she knows and the new one in which she finds herself. Getting back to her own time period never seems a priority, perhaps because there is no simple answer of how one travels through time when disappearing in the Bermuda Triangle and she has no family left to go back to. This makes for a more believable story. For me, the second time-slip is much stronger, fantastically portrayed in a way that makes us look anew at our own world and the technology we take for granted.

This spicy romance successfully intertwines humor and drama to spin a web of intrigue and danger. Aside from the historical aspects of the story, I was drawn to the sketches that Jacen draws. The reason for their inclusion remains unclear until the final pages, which then makes perfect sense but kept me guessing (not an easy feat to achieve). As the historical events of the War of 1812 unfold, disparate forces must work together to protect the fledgling United States, while Ana and Jacen struggle to keep both themselves and their burgeoning love alive.




View all my reviews