I’ve got to be honest, I am not a real fan of so-called
historical fiction, but there have been a handful of recent examples of in the
genre that I have found to be highly entertaining. Being a bit of an amateur
book collector, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that these books are centered
on the book business and feature some great and nefarious characters.
Author Matthew Pearl has made a career out of churning
out an interesting array of colorful characters in books like The Dante Club and The Poe Shadow, and he continues that tradition in his latest
outing, The Last Bookaneer.
Pen Davenport is an infamous bookaneer; a character who
makes his living slithering about in the underbelly of the publishing business.
Davenport isn’t a writer, editor of publisher; he is by trade a thief and a
master at working the system by which loose copyright laws of the era make it
easy for bookaneers to swipe manuscripts and less than scrupulous publishers to
print and sell books cheaply to hungry readers leaving famous and not so famous
writers in the poor house.
The hunt is on for what amounts to the last manuscript
of Robert Louis Stevenson as pearl weaves and intricate tail of intrigue with
these great fictional characters and conjures these book pirates against a back
drop based loosely in the reality of Stevenson’s time on Samoa. He balances a
fine mix of the era and the adventure to come up with another entertaining
tale.
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