Seaflower: A Kydd Novel [Paperback]

Stockwin's Kydd saga, including Seaflower, is based on historic events, allowing Kydd and his friend Nicholas Renzi to be placed in situations which reveal the real-life world of below-decks sailors in Nelson's Navy. Seaflower takes the pair from Portsmouth Harbour and the trumpted-up court martial of an officer with influence to the Caribbean, where Kydd faces personal challenges which continue to mature and shape him. Aboard the cunning topsail cutter Seaflower, they sail against the French and the overwhelming forces of the tropical seas.

Stockwin is at his best in describing the eighteenth-century in which Kydd lives, including the ships, exotic areas of the world, and the sea. Seaflower brings Kydd's characterization to a new high. I cannot wait to read the next title in the series, Mutiny.

This is best new naval fiction during the Age of Sail to be published in recent years!

In actual fact, during that time there were more losses from disease, storms, shipwrecks, and accidents in general, than there were from enemy action. The description of Kydd's survival after coming down with yellow fever would be typical for the location and time period. Frederick Hoffman in his autobiography, "A Sailor of King George," related his experience aboard a ship where he was one out of 16 midshipmen, and one out of two who survived a yellow fever epidemic. The survivors lived to tell their tales, so stories are naturally about survivors. There was reputedly an old toast in the Royal Navy for "a long war or a fever season," i.e., others misfortunes opened opportunities for promotion.

While it may seem a little unreal for a ship or officer to have one success after another, such officers did exist at that time and many, including Nelson, achieved rapid promotion by their successes.

There were young men from well-to-do families who ran off to sea for various reasons (just as some later joined the French Foreign Legion). Some survived and achieved success. The character of Nicholas Renzi is believable.

Two large elements of the novel don't work so well, though. The first is the plot, so-called. Kydd and his friends go through one apparent challenge after another, but all are easily resolved. Just as the drama starts to build, the characters solve the problem or the danger goes away, resulting in repeated anticlimaxes. The plot does not seem to have an overall arc or a structure of building tension... essentially, there's no point.

The second problem is with characterization. Though the characters are appealing enough in themselves, they're never challenged and none of their experiences seem to change them. They don't develop through the book.

I can't really recommend this.