Jason , etc.'s Reviews > Pirate Coast: Thomas Jefferson, the First Marines & the Secret Mission of 1805

My expectations for unabridged audio books are that they keep me engaged as I drive through the midwest. Those of you who have ever driven through the midwest will understand that doing so can be a bit tedious to say the least, so the prospect of having a dude or dude-ette read me a ripping good yarn goes a long way toward maintaining sanity behind the wheel. I lean toward historical non-fiction because it's always been my cup of tea, though I'm equally happy with John Grisham/Stephen King/J.K Rowling in a pinch.

Having said all of that, I found this book a slow starter that built up speed in the middle and kept it up right right through to the end. Historical non-fiction provides you the benefit of hindsight, but a good writer can tell the story in a way that places you in the middle of the moment so that you're either shaking your head and cursing or cheering the various players involved in the action. The overly simplified explanation of the plot is that this is the story of how politics helped ruin a brave man, who also seemed intent upon ruining himself.

The larger version of the plot is that this is the story of how the stanza in the Marine hymn concerning '...the shores of Tripoli' came to be. The book has a little bit of everything from well-written battle scenes, political intrigue, diplomatic buffoonery, and a fair amount of drinking. What William Eaton, a little band of Marines, and a larger mercenary army accomplished in North Africa makes for an amazing and sometimes painful story about the cost of ambition and how fickle a 'grateful nation' can sometimes be.