#pirate books

[transbookoftheday]

🏳️‍⚧️🏴‍☠️ Trans Books To Read If You Love "Our Flag Means Death" 🏴‍☠️🏳️‍⚧️

Can't get enough of Our Flag Means Death? Read some trans pirate books!

On Mar León de la Rosa's sixteenth birthday, el Diablo comes calling. Mar is a transmasculine nonbinary teen pirate hiding a magical ability to manipulate fire and ice. But their magic isn't enough to reverse a wicked bargain made by their father, and now el Diablo has come to collect his payment: the soul of Mar's father and the entire crew of their ship. When Mar is miraculously rescued by the sole remaining pirate crew in the Caribbean, el Diablo returns to give them a choice: give up their soul to save their father by the harvest moon, or never see him again. The task is impossible - Mar refuses to make a bargain, and there's no way their magic is a match for el Diablo. Then Mar finds the most unlikely allies: Bas, an infuriatingly arrogant and handsome pirate - and the captain's son; and Dami, a gender-fluid demonio whose motives are never quite clear. For the first time in their life, Mar may have the courage to use their magic. It could be their only redemption - or it could mean certain death.

(The audiobook for "The Wicked Bargain" is narrated by Vico Ortiz!)

In a world divided by colonialism and threaded with magic, a desperate orphan turned pirate and a rebellious imperial lady find a connection on the high seas. Aboard the pirate ship Dove, Flora the girl takes on the identity of Florian the man to earn the respect and protection of the crew. For Flora, former starving urchin, the brutal life of a pirate is about survival: don’t trust, don’t stick out, and don’t feel. But on this voyage, Flora is drawn to the Lady Evelyn Hasegawa, who is headed to an arranged marriage she dreads. Flora doesn’t expect to be taken under Evelyn’s wing, and Evelyn doesn’t expect to find such a deep bond with the pirate Florian. Neither expects to fall in love. Soon the unlikely pair set in motion a wild escape that will free a captured mermaid (coveted for her blood) and involve the mysterious Pirate Supreme, an opportunistic witch, double agents, and the all-encompassing Sea herself. Deftly entwining swashbuckling action and quiet magic, Maggie Tokuda-Hall’s inventive debut novel conjures a diverse cast of characters seeking mastery over their fates while searching for answers to big questions about identity, power, and love.

The Lost Boys say that Peter Pan went back to England because of Wendy Darling, but Wendy is just an old life he left behind. Neverland is his real home. So when Peter returns to it after ten years in the real world, he's surprised to find a Neverland that no longer seems to need him. The only person who truly missed Peter is Captain James Hook, who is delighted to have his old rival back. But when a new war ignites between the Lost Boys and Hook's pirates, the ensuing bloodshed becomes all too real - and Peter's rivalry with Hook starts to blur into something far more complicated, sensual, and deadly.

In the Christian Republic, homosexual people are given two choices—a camp to "fix" them, or exile to the distant islands populated by lesbians and gay men. Sixteen-year-old Jason chooses exile and expects a hardscrabble life but instead finds a thriving, supportive community. While exploring his identity as a transgender boy he also discovers adventure: kraken attacks, naval battles, a flying island built by asexual people, and a daring escape involving glow-in-the-dark paint. He also has a desperate crush on Sky, a spirited buccaneer girl, but fear keeps him from expressing his feelings. When Jason and his companions discover the Republicans are planning a war of extermination, they rally the people of the Rainbow Islands to fight back. Shy, bookish Jason will have to find his inner courage or everything and everyone he loves will be lost forever.

Book titles:

The Wicked Bargain by Gabe Cole Novoa

The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea by Maggie Tokuda-Hall

Peter Darling by Austin Chant

Rainbow Islands by Devin Harnois

[taryo88]

This is my key takeaway from the sneak peek of the first chapter of Alexandra Rowland’s upcoming queer pirate book Running Close to the Wind 😂 Cannot WAIT to read the rest of it!!

[out-of-the-forest-i-come]

Queer Pirate Books

In Deeper Waters; by F.T. Lukens

Running Close to the Wind; by Alexandra Rowland, coming out June 11th!

The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea; by Maggie Tokuda-Hall

A Clash of Steel; by C.B. Lee

Compass Rose; Anna Burke (sci-fi)

The Abyss Surrounds Us; by Emily Skrutskie (sci-fi)

The Forever Sea; by Joshua Phillip Johnson

The Black God's Drums; by P. Djèlí Clark (scif-fi)

Peter Darling; by Austin Chant

A Song of Silver and Gold; by Mel Karibian

The Wicked Bargain; Gabe Cole Novoa

Escape to Pirate Island; by Niamh Murphy

A Pirate's Life for Tea (Tomes and Tea, Book 2); by Rebecca Thorne

The Unbinding of Mary Reade; by Miriam McNamara

[coloringhobbit-blog]

Avra defending his orphan gruel from a possum

[digitaldruiid]

OK hear me out - why can't I find any male siren x female pirate books/fics?

Like I came across this on insta and now I need this🤭

Dm for credit/removal

[faegrimes]

[nopoodles]

Tumblr Cover Reveal

There Is No Place For A Dandy On A Pirate Ship

Nat should be doing what dandies do best: creating fashion, trading information, working on the edges of high society to further their own aims, and flirting with scandal. Instead, they're in the bowels of a ship, captured by pirates intent on ransoming them back to their family as soon as they find out to which family they should send the letter. Unfortunately for all involved, Nat knows one thing the pirates can never be allowed to find out: They are unransomable. Their family has plenty enough money to pay any ransom, but Nat's father sent them to sea in the first place, put them in the path of these pirates, because he wanted Nat out of the way. Ransoms create scandal. Nat can't afford another

My pirate novel is now available for pre-order both in signed paperbacks from me and in unsigned regular paperback and ebooks from other retailers.

If you're looking for links, Tumblr can be tricky with those so I'm gonna throw them in a reblog but you can use my pinned post to get to my website where all the links always are.

Release Day: 23 April 2024

[meridianriver]

Back at it again in Krispy Kreme with a dumb sketch of Avra Helvaçi from Alexandra Rowland’s upcoming novel, Running Close to the Wind!

If you’re a fan of Our Flag Means Death, queer fantasy, pirates, shenanigans, or protagonists who are a hot mess that you can’t help but love, this is the book for you!

Running Close to the Wind releases on June 11th, but you can read an excerpt here!

[downtherocksintotheseaweed]

Do you like casts of queer characters? And pirates?

and are trying to fill the gaping bleeding hole ofmd has left in your heart?

Well look no further!

This blog is dedicated to an original novel about both of those things! Under the working tagline of "A Candle and a Sailor," this book focuses on the main character, Val, as he dives into the life of piracy for the first time. Set in a fictional world, he boards Eden's Vengeance, a well-respected and infamous ship sailing the Blackwater Sea. Its captain, even more infamous, is everything Val's ever wanted to be—ever wanted to have. He's respected by his crew and performs heists and thievery with an organized plan like no other pirate captain in the books. Val joins his rankings in hopes to serve under him and learn his ways. But, when the Captain's legacy isn't as smooth sailing as he makes it out to be, what role will Val play? Will he be swept under the current like most, or will he take command?

This blog (@downtherocksintotheseaweed) is for updates, snippets, and answering questions all about the novel! While it is still in its early stages, the plot, characters, and world are fully developed. Any questions, comments, or otherwise can be directed to this blog's ask box

Happy sailing! - J.

[jessread-s]

Thanks to @fiercereadsya for providing me with an e-ARC in exchange for an honest review

✩⚔️🗺️Review: 

Tricia Levenseller just doesn’t miss when it comes to pirate adventure novels! 

Following the events of the “Daughter of the Pirate King” duology, “Vengeance of the Pirate Queen” centers around Sorinda Veshtas, the pirate queen’s assassin. As a newly appointed captain, Sorinda is dispatched on a rescue mission. Unfortunately, her sailing master just so happens to be Kearan Erroth, the one person attuned to her every movement in the shadows. Sadly, it’s near impossible to avoid him on a ship with few hiding places. But when the crew faces the King of the Undersea, a being who can control the dead, Sorinda’s helmsman might be the only one that can save her from becoming an undead queen. 

I. Love. Sorinda. Veshtas. I always have ever since reading “Daughter of the Pirate Queen.” Now I love her even more. Levenseller never fails to create strong female characters and Sorinda might just be the fiercest one of all. Her past is revealed in bits and pieces. Once I saw the whole picture I was devastated. Her vengeance for what happened to her family is a driving force in her life and motivated her to become a weapon. At the same time, she is consumed by guilt. 

Kearan is the one who helps her realize that she is worthy of life, love, and saving and that it is okay to lean on others. Their romance truly left me a sopping mess. I enjoyed watching Sorinda try to avoid him as much as possible until she could no longer ignore her budding feelings. Watching their squabbles turn into playful banter. Their reluctant love story is a beautiful one as they learn to confide in each other and accept their own flaws. 

As a huge fan of the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise, I enjoyed how this book pays homage to The Curse of the Black Pearl. I was on the edge of my seat, soaring through each chapter wondering how Sorinda and her crew would defeat an army of the undead. The explosive ending does not disappoint. This swashbuckling adventure fulfilled all of my pirate loving dreams! 

Cross-posted to: Instagram | Amazon | Goodreads | StoryGraph

[dragonbadgerbooks]

August Fun Day Book Photo Challenge: August 14, 2023 International Pirate Month

I'll be honest, I was not a fan of any of the daily holidays, but pirates are always great. So enjoy some classic and modern takes on piracy!

[lost-in-wond3rland]

If anybody has any good pirate books with a touch of ~romance~ let a girl know lol

[soupscribbles]

Leviathan

Just a lil monster design from the book I’m currently working on🐍🦕🌊

[balanceoflightanddark]

Dinotopia Lost

Alright, so a while back I made a post describing how sentient predatory dinosaurs were handled in the original Dinotopia books. I mentioned a novel called Dinotopia Lost that actually focuses on the predators of the Rainy Basin along with an intriguing premise about pirates landing on the normally peaceful island, and how I considered making a post about it should I get the opportunity.

Well, that opportunity is now.

Written by noted sci-fi writer Alan Dean Foster, Dinotopia Lost can best be described as a crossover between Pirates of the Caribbean and The Lost World: Jurassic Park.

...no, I'm not kidding. It's a pretty accurate description of the book.

Swept up by a freak storm, the pirate ship Condor, lead by the fearsome Captain Brognar Blackstrap and his first mate Smiggens, is marooned on Dinotopia. Deciding to make the most of their impromptu visit, they come across a family of Struthiomimus and immediately take them captive to sell them to the highest bidder, believing them to be a rare species of animal. Naturally like all dinosaurs on the island, they are sentient, but aren't able to communicate this at all to the newcomers. To make matters worse, the pirates not only decide to make a foray into the dangerous Rainy Basin, but they also kidnap a juvenile Tyrannosaurus rex.

One of the Struthies manages to escape her bonds and manages to relay the incident to Treetown, securing help from Will Denison, a Skybax rider and one of the protagonists from the original books. Along with a Protoceratops named Chaz, the three make their way into the dangerous Rainy Basin in pursuit of the pirates. Things get complicated though when the juvenile Tyrannosaur's gigantic parents are on the prowl, and tension begins to run within the ranks of the pirates. Along with an oncoming monstrous storm on the horizon, it's a race against both time, man, and beast as the heroes try to rescue the captives from Brognar's clutches.

Already the premise is pretty intriguing. Dinotopia as a setting is depicted as a utopian society where pacificism is the norm. So the idea of a group of pirates, a decidedly not pacifistic career, landing on their shores is quite an interesting scenario. Does it work?

...well. Actually, it does. Captain Brognar and his crew (especially Smiggens) are arguably the stars of the novel since the first half details them exploring the wilderness and encountering dinosaurs for the first time. Thing is, the majority of them aren't portrayed as your typical swashbucklers. They're a motley crew that comes from many nations, all brought together since society had rejected them (one almost got arrested for stealing bread for his family). While Brognar comes the closest to being your stereotypical pirate captain, the narrative makes it clear that he's the one that brought everyone together, a figure that the crew both admires and fear in equal measure for his courage, his temper, and his surprisingly quick thinking. He's not exactly the best person to work under, but you can understand why anybody would respect him.

His first mate Smiggens is the opposite. He's the only one that comes from a learned background, which puts him at odds with the others when he gets curious about the island they landed on. Including Brognar, though the captain does have a good deal of respect for his reliability. It's also Smiggens who's the first to realize that the Golden Age of Piracy is ending since their fleeing from a galleon was got them in this mess in the first place. Hell, it's a fact many of the pirates do admit as the story progresses and that many of them, outside of Brognar and his most violent followers, actually resent their lot in life. Brognar's just that much of an influence that they believe they don't have much of a choice. They're not entirely bad people, just caught up under really bad circumstances.

Their opposites in the Dinotopians bring this out. The novel does a decent job of introducing the society they live in. Especially with Will Denison as a daredevil looking to make a name for himself. He's reckless, taking the opportunity to go save the family without much backup aside from Chaz and Keelk (the escaped Struthiomimus). But he's not completely out of his depths since he's had his fair share of adventures in the past, and works more as a diplomat than an action hero you might expect from a story like this. Especially once he gets to the Rainy Basin and encounters the pirates where he tries to negotiate with them to...varying degrees of success.

His opposite is Chaz, a young translating Protoceratops who has a bit of a chip on his shoulder due to an incident involving Will's father and the famous translator Bix when they initially arrived in Dinotopia. Chaz is stuffy, not really used to going out into the wilderness and hasn't gotten the experience of his peers. He does mean well mind you, but he's not gonna be happy about it. Thing is, he's not one to back down and when Will is captured by the pirates, he's one of the most adamant that the human gets rescued. Even braves the teeth of the carnosaurs to translate for Will.

As for the carnosaurs, they're the other real stand out stars in this novel. Like I mentioned before, how Gurney handled them as choosing to live like their ancestors but aren't above negotiation is handled well here. The society of the Rainy Basin denizens are given a lot of focus which is actually very engrossing. For one, there are laws that basically say that everyone that ventures into the Rainy Basin is fair game for the carnosaurs (which makes sense given the amount of warnings and common sense everyone practices around that place). Even then, the carnivorous dinosaurs don't actually hunt most of the time since most of their diet consists of dying dinosaurs that have made pilgrimages to various graveyards throughout the rainforest (won't stop them from hunting, but it's explained as an innate predatory instinct). They also deeply respect the boundaries of each other, actively avoiding fights and even eating alongside one another if there's enough meat for everyone.

And they do have a strict code of honor. Crookeye and Shethorn, the two parent tyrannosaurs, willingly work with Will to find their kidnapped daughter after some negotiations. While Will is a bit nervous about working with them, Chaz assures the humans that no carnosaur will go back on their word. While there is some tension due to the understandable worry and anger of the parents, they do come to respect Will, Chaz, and Keelk. Even giving them names in their tongue, which is a great honor in itself. They naturally consider the party friends by the time they depart ways.

Turns out giving the heroes names in their tongue is the best thing they could've done since Will is able to use what he's learned of their language to communicate with Prettykill, the juvenile. Prettykill has just as much of an attitude like her parents, but amplified by her poor treatment and being separated from her family. It's a very understandable emotion that Will is able to sympathize with. It's especially easy for readers to see the tyrannosaurs not necessarily as monsters but a concerned and scared family trying to get back together. Especially since we get a foil in Keelk, the Struthie who is worried sick to death about her parents and siblings being held captive and almost runs herself to death trying to get help.

Which honestly one of the big themes of the novel: looking past the surface and finding what unites instead of dividing. The carnosaurs do have a form of society that, while different from the civilized Dinotopians, still have a lot of the same customs and values. The heroes and tyrannosaurs are united in their concerned for their loved ones being kidnapped and wanting to do the right thing. Even the pirates are humanized, with Will's previous experiences being a newcomer to Dinotopia being used as a comparison to how the pirates view the dinosaurs as either animals or monsters. Hell, Smiggens actually ends up wanting to stay in Dinotopia since he knows there's no future for the crew in the outside world, and manages to convince the vast majority of the crew along with Will's convincing. Plus the majesty of Dinotopia awes them into rethinking their violent ways.

A particular favorite character of mine is a good example of this: Tarqua. Tarqua is an elderly Deinonychus who had chosen a life of an ascetic. He's the first dinosaur to speak directly to the pirates, even causing them to pause a bit when he demonstrates his capability to use martial arts.

...yes. This book has a Deinonychus who meditates for most of his time, delivers some actually relevant philosophy (making him a literal Philosoraptor) and knows martial arts.

And yes, it's just as awesome as it sounds.

As a whole, I definitely believe Dinotopia Lost is worth a read. The themes and story are well executed and the characters while not perfect (a vast majority of Brognar's crew aren't that well developed and Will only gets involved around the mid-point) are still able to carry the story and are well done and developed overall. I really do think Foster does a good job of bringing Dinotopia, in particular the Rainy Basin, to life and does justice to such an interesting concept.

[beanbowlbaggins]

The Fairyloot editions of the Daughter of the Pirate King and Daughter of the Siren Queen duology by Tricia Levenseller is so pretty. I love that the combined sprayed edges make an image of a ship. I haven't had these books on my radar (and my to-be-read list is already overwhelming), but I dream that I could have these books on my shelf.