This was such a great read! Thanks, Ain, for lending it to me!
The year is 1838 in the West Indies. The Pirate Captain, worried that his pirates are getting bored of "all that lying on the beach and the native women, wandering about with no tops on" decide to set off on another Adventure. They are informed of a ship called The Beagle, transporting gold bullion from the colonies back to England and decide to attack it, to find that the only treasure on the ship is the young Charles Darwin and his trained Man-Panzee. Determined to assist Darwin in rescuing his brother Erasmus who has been kidnapped by the Bishop of Oxford, they head off to England.
This book is funny with capital F-U-N-N-Y! The Pirate Captain is a debonair man, with a glossy beard, who cannot quite remember the names of his crew but is certainly on target with his Periodic Table (despite the fact that the Table was not invented yet in 1838). Circus freaks, grisly murders, a pirate convention and a science lecture all get thrown into the mix at a laugh a minute.
Apparently Defoe wrote The Pirates to convince a woman to leave her boyfriend for him. She didn't. I'm sure other women will. Just read the note from the Pirate Captain on the back cover:
"Dear Reader,
I'm choosing to picture you as an attractive young woman, about nineteen, perhaps reading this 150 years from now, while in bed wearing just a daring negligee, tanned thighs stretched out on those silk sheets of yours. You're no doubt wondering why the men of your time couldn't be a bit more like the charming piratical rogue writing these words, instead of the monstrous oversized brains they've probably evolved into. Well, what are you waiting for? With your advanced scientific knowledge it's no doubt a cinch to reconstitute me from just a few of my piratical cells, and to this I have stuck a couple of hairs from my glossy beard into the back cover. I take it you still have ham in the future? A nice big ham waiting for me would be a treat."
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