Pirate novel recommendation?

Could anybody recommend an absolutely awesome novel about pirates? Preferably well-researched, historically correct, realistic, etc.

(And yes, I’ve already read Treasure Island. Twice. ;))

If you like a fantasy element, Tim Powers’s On Stranger Tides more than fills the bill (it’s also well-researched and historically correct otherwise).

The Pyrates - George MacDonald Fraser

Rafael Sabatini’s Captain Blood. Then watch the movie with Errol Flynn.

I want to simply second RealityChuck’s plug for Tim Powers’ On Stranger Tides. It really is an awesome book.

A couple of not-quite-on-topic recommendations:

Peter Earle’s excellent history of The Sack of Panama offers an excellent look at piracy in the Caribbean, and the pirate career of Captain Henry Morgan. It’s not a novel, but at times it reads like one.
While it’s not a book, and the historical accuracy is a bit questionable (Though I can’t say it’s been falsified, precisely - who can tell what the true history of Cornwall might really be?) if you’re looking for a fun pirate story you can’t go wrong with Gilbert & Sullivan’s The Pirates of Penzance. I have a fondness for the 1983 version with Linda Ronstadt, Kevin Kline, and Angela Lansbury, mentioned here. It’s not the most accurate production, but Kevin Kline as The Pirate King is well worth it.

The Walrus and the Warwolf, by Hugh Cook.

I’m sure that the dragons, sea serpents, magic snakes that make people immune to drunkenness and disease, crashed spaceships from the future, ogres, magical bottles that contain entire worlds, and magical rocks that turn people into rocks are extremely historically accurate.

Then again, maybe Tanith Lee’s Piratica would be more up your alley.

A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the Most Notorious Pirates by Charles Johnson is a must read for anyone who likes pirates. It’s a non-fiction book originally published in the 1720s. This book, more than any other, is responsible for how we view pirates. You can see that this book influenced both Treasure Island and Peter Pan. It even has a pirate in there with a peg leg! The Adventures of Roderick Random by Tobias Smollett isn’t exactly a pirate novel but the main character ends up on a ship twice. Once on a privateer and again when he was press ganged only a warship. You may recognize Smollett’s name as he was the captain of the Hispanola in Treasure Island. No doubt this book left an impression on R.L Stevenson as well.

This.

Be prepared. Swashes will be buckled.

BTW, I bow to no man as a fan of Tim Powers, and On Stranger Tides is a great choice too. In instances like this though, it’s often best to go with the classics.

Hugh Cook and, god help us, Tanith Fucking Lee don’t write historically correct, realistic pirate books.

Pirate Freedom

As for nonfiction, American Colonies, by Alan Taylor is a good modern source. Learn about the real Pirates of the Caribbean! How, in the early days, the line between the Royal Navy and privateers was as blurry as the line between privateers and pirates. (Captain Morgan – yes, that one – once was Provisional Governor of Jamaica.) And how there was sometimes a class-war element to it – when pirates captured a ship they would put the captain on trial, and hang or spare him according to his crew’s testimony as to his cruelty or kindness; and many turned to piracy as an escape from the rigid, hierarchical society of the time and the abominable discipline of naval and merchant vessels.

On Stranger Tides, it is…

Thanks guys :slight_smile:

There’s pirates in Neal Stephenson’s Baroque Cycle.

Do not waste your time reading Michael Chrichton’s last book “Pirate Latitudes” (published posthumously). Very poorly researched - lots of errors regarding those old sailing galleons. To give him credit, I will assume that if he had been still alive he would never have let the book out in the condition it was.

The three books I was going to recommend - Captain Blood, On Stranger Tides, and The Pyrates - have all been mentioned already. So I’ll just second them.

I will point out that none of them let accuracy and realism get in the way of a good story.

The Pirates! In An Adventure With Scientists was the first thing that came to mind.

Oh. It’s well researched, kind of…

Many of my favorites have been mentioned–On Stranger Tides, Captain Blood, The Walrus and the Warwolf, and *The Pyrates *are all wonderful books in their own special ways. None of them are particularly historically accurate, though. Another novel that feels a little closer to Reality and farther from Romance that I can recommend is called The Guardshipby James L. Nelson.

It’s a mixed bag, but you might try John Steinbeck’s Cup of Gold, a fictionalized biography of Welsh pirate Henry (“I prefer to be called a privateer”) Morgan.

Not sure it qualifies as a full-on pirate novel, but I would highly recommend Matthew Kneale’s * English Passengers*.