On Stranger Tides

I kind of wish I'd read the research for this book instead of the book itself. All the stuff surrounding the main story is fascinating – voodoo magic and life in the Caribbean towards the end of the Pirate Era – or at least exhaustively well-researched – all the sailing and nautical stuff. And the idea of mashing up magic and pirates is such a great one, obviously, that it inspired games and movies. But the story itself just kind of devolves into genre fiction.

And it's jarring (at least in 2014) to see such a lousy damsel-in-distress role for the only two women characters, even after obvious attempts to turn the women into Strong Female Characters. Plus he has this weird, petty hatred of overweight people – any description of someone weak-willed, corrupt, or foolish invariably mentions how fat he is. Or “mincing,” which is a whole different kind of unfortunate.

With so many really solid images, a fantastic setting, exhaustive research, and interesting details, I just wish the book hadn't been so neatly tied up and so completely predictable.

This was a pretty fun pirate romp that kept me engaged. I listened to this as an audiobook, and highly recommend doing so as the narrator made it all the better. It doesn't have the deepest of plots, and it's obviously far fetched, but it's a pirate book, and a damn good one at that. Highly recommend for pirate fans.