'The sea has always felt like my true birthplace. It is where I found myself. It is where I found Mary.'
New Providence island, 1719. A fierce and fearless Anne Bonny joins Jack Rackham and the crew of the pirate ship William, embarking on the adventure of a lifetime.
'Born of the Sea' follows Anne as she cross-dresses, drinks and fights her way through the Caribbean during the Golden Age of Piracy. But Anne's life is changed forever when she meets Mary Read, plotting a new course on a voyage of self-discovery.
'Born of the Sea' is a romance novella based on the true story of infamous 18th-century gender-bending pirates Anne Bonny and Mary Read, who many historians believe were lovers.
'An engrossing tale...utterly romantic' ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
'A sexy, Sapphic, swashbuckling romp...I loved it.' ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
'I was given this book by one of my students...I work with older LGBTQ youth and will be assigning this to them for June 2021 reading.' ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
'Brave and brilliant...This little book challenges gender and sexuality in a fresh and powerful way, which is remarkable given it is historical fiction.' ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
- Amazon and Goodreads reader reviews
'The sea has always felt like my true birthplace. It is where I found myself. It is where I found Mary.'
New Providence island, 1719. A fierce and fearless Anne Bonny joins Jack Rackham and the crew of the pirate ship William, embarking on the adventure of a lifetime.
'Born of the Sea' follows Anne as she cross-dresses, drinks and fights her way through the Caribbean during the Golden Age of Piracy. But Anne's life is changed forever when she meets Mary Read, plotting a new course on a voyage of self-discovery.
'Born of the Sea' is a romance novella based on the true story of infamous 18th-century gender-bending pirates Anne Bonny and Mary Read, who many historians believe were lovers.
'An engrossing tale...utterly romantic' ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
'A sexy, Sapphic, swashbuckling romp...I loved it.' ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
'I was given this book by one of my students...I work with older LGBTQ youth and will be assigning this to them for June 2021 reading.' ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
'Brave and brilliant...This little book challenges gender and sexuality in a fresh and powerful way, which is remarkable given it is historical fiction.' ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
- Amazon and Goodreads reader reviews
My name, in those days, was Anne Bonny.
I’m told I was born in Cork, Ireland, sometime before 1700, but my father never told me the year, nor the day nor month of my birth. I should think he never really cared enough to know. Later, I would imagine I was born at sea in a night tempest; mountainous waves throwing the ship around like a twig in a rolling barrel of grog, my mother spread-eagled on the deck, her hair splayed out, screaming like a wild banshee. The sea has always felt like my true birthplace. It is where I found myself. It is where I found Mary.
I regret that neither my birth nor my early life was quite that romantic, however. I was an illegitimate child of my father – a lawyer – and his housemaid. To escape the scandal, and his wife’s wrath, my father dressed me as a boy and passed me off as a young clerk, opening legal letters and such. That was until my chest started to grow in, and my rosy cheeks and lips likened to those of a lady. Gentlemen and not-so-gentle-men began to pay me attention. Whether or not they knew I was a lass I do not know, but they nevertheless took a liking to me, be it a boy or girl they were after. More than once, I had to fight a fellow off, which was not a problem for me. My father used to tell me I inherited my rage from my mother – we both were crowned with the virago’s tell-tale tangle of fire-red hair – but I reckon he had more than a little to do with it. Eventually, when one particularly over-amorous lawyer made his advances, I stabbed him in the neck with a paperknife. He spent some time in the infirmary and it kicked up a fair old stink with my father. Before long, the truth of both my sex and my parentage was uncovered and my father left Ireland a disgraced man – with my birth mother and me in tow – to start a new life in Charles Town, Carolina.
That first day of our voyage to the colonies sticks clear and sharp in my memory, like the pleasure-pain prick of a hatpin. It is a memory almost as sharp as the first time I saw Mary.
Have you ever crawled up the bowsprit, at the very foremost point of a schooner? The ocean is all you can see. All you can smell and hear. A five-foot scooch backwards and the topsail and fore rigging will surround you. But sit up at the tip of the bowsprit and there is nothing but unsullied water all around.
I remember straddling it on that day, my boots crossed tight underneath at the ankles, watching two dozen gulls dip and swoop above my head, my eyes squinting in the afternoon sun. Looking out over the vast ocean, the wind whipping at my curls, I felt like a bird myself. I felt free. I felt like home.
I adore pirate stories as much as I love the history and lore of piracy itself. My only complaint is that this was a 20,000 word novella and it wasn’t longer. This could easily have been a full length, epic tale focused on the two most infamous female pirates on the high seas.
The story follows Anne Bonny and her life into piracy through Calico Jack Rackham. Until she meets Mary, disguised as a man and her whole world changes.
Historians believe Mary and Anne were in a romantic relationship and this is a fictional take on this unproven theory. The author does a great job taking something rooted in factual history with an element of theory and blending it into a believable tale.
It is a sweetly short tale that covers the length of Anne’s few years of piracy and the tragic aftermath. When they are finally captured, Jack is hung while Mary and Anne are held as prisoners. Both of them are pregnant at the time and are spared death by hanging. But from what we know, Mary dies in prison from fever and there is little known about Anne after her capture. The author speculates that Anne survives and lives out her years which is a beautiful way to end a story of a love that is doomed from the start.
The writing is sharp and concise but flows beautifully and gives us an insight into Anne’s mind, her thoughts and feelings. There are moments of tension and terror as Anne fights for the life she wants and for the woman she loves. While being a tale with LGBTQIA+ themes, the focus is more on the fact that this is a historical fiction with romance elements, and reads more like an autobiography by Anne herself than a romance novel. It stays true to the history of these two real people and the facts that are known while taking creative liberties with some of it.
A completely enjoyable tale, although I did want it to be longer! Fans of pirates all over will like this quick read that packs a punch of history.