Customer Reviews

A Game of Bones (The Privateersman Mysteries)

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When privateersman Captain Harry Ludlow and his socialite brother James Ludlow return to Britain to find the fleets at Spithead and the Nore in mutiny, Harry assumes James will want to be in the middle of the action. James puts Harry in his place by informing him that Portsmouth is hardly the center of things and heads for London. I always found James a distraction, and probably enjoyed his time in London even more than he did.

Unlike some of the other books in this series, this one's less of a mystery and more of a spy novel. It further develops the impetuous and manipulative character of Harry Ludlow, and sees him negotiating with everyone: local smugglers, able seaman, through half the admiralty and even William Pitt himself. This installment also has more action, including a combined land/sea battle in a river with galleys and ships.

Like most of the other sea heroes (Alan Lewrie, Horatio Hornblower and Jack Aubrey, in particular), Harry's luck on land is not what it is at sea. Although in this book, it could be argued Harry makes his own "luck" at sea and on land.

Read the first five of these books first. They tell one long story in episodes, much like other nautical fiction series. After Aubrey, Kydd and Hornblower, Harry Ludlow's my favorite sea officer. The novels move along with crisp dialogue and excellent nautical action. The fourth Thomas Paine Kydd book, "Mutiny", by Julian Stockwin, covers the same events from a rather different perspective, and I think gives a better perspective on the mutiny itself.

Set in the Age of Fighting Sail, right at the close of the 18th century, A Game of Bones is a seagoing adventure novel with seasonings of whodunit. Part of author and sea lover David Donachie's "Privateersman Mysteries" series, A Game of Bones follows seaman Harry Ludlow and his exhausted crew as their search for an easy prize lands them amid a desperate fight for survival. His Majesty's Navy has erupted in mutiny; sea froth with be mixed with blood before all is said and done, in this salty historical adventure.

This is novel No. 6 in a series about Privateersman Harry Ludlow. The author assumes you have read previous books in the series, as references are made to previous events without clearly explaining them. Most of the action takes place on land or aboard moored ships.

Much of the plot material has been used before. Patrick Obrien's novel "Post Captain" found Captain Aubrey in debt after his bank failed, and sent him on a quest for prize money to satisfy his debts. Various novels have included fictional accounts of the mutinies at Spithead and the Nore (See C. Northcote Parkinson's "The Fireship," Richard Woodman's "A King's Cutter," etc.), although this novel puts a different spin on the story.

This is a readable novel, although the hero comes across as a somewhat boneheaded fumbler at times, who gets his men killed to satisfy his quest for gold. It seems to alter history in some areas, e.g., I recall that a significant number of mutineers were hanged after the Nore Mutiny.