Captain Blood is THE MAN ! A soldier, a doctor, a pirate, a lover, and even a politician. He does it all, which makes for a very fun, lively and interesting read. ( )

This review is for this audiobook edition only; see my paperback edition for my thoughts on the novel itself.
4.5*
Robert Whitfield (aka Simon Vance) is one of my favorite narrators, particularly for classics. He doesn't disappoint in this historical fiction about 1760s England & Caribbean. However, perhaps because I first encountered this story via the Errol Flynn/Olivia de Havilland film, I found that I preferred my experience reading this to that of listening to it. Whitfield's various voices for the characters were well done (Peter Blood's Irish accent was specially good) but they weren't the voices I was used to and several times I found that I had lost the thread of the story. So in this case, the audiobook loses a ½ star instead of gaining one...

Merged review:

This review is for this audiobook edition only; see my paperback edition for my thoughts on the novel itself.
4.5*
Robert Whitfield (aka Simon Vance) is one of my favorite narrators, particularly for classics. He doesn't disappoint in this historical fiction about 1760s England & Caribbean. However, perhaps because I first encountered this story via the Errol Flynn/Olivia de Havilland film, I found that I preferred my experience reading this to that of listening to it. Whitfield's various voices for the characters were well done (Peter Blood's Irish accent was specially good) but they weren't the voices I was used to and several times I found that I had lost the thread of the story. So in this case, the audiobook loses a ½ star instead of gaining one...

Merged review:

This review is for this audiobook edition only; see my paperback edition for my thoughts on the novel itself.
4.5*
Robert Whitfield (aka Simon Vance) is one of my favorite narrators, particularly for classics. He doesn't disappoint in this historical fiction about 1760s England & Caribbean. However, perhaps because I first encountered this story via the Errol Flynn/Olivia de Havilland film, I found that I preferred my experience reading this to that of listening to it. Whitfield's various voices for the characters were well done (Peter Blood's Irish accent was specially good) but they weren't the voices I was used to and several times I found that I had lost the thread of the story. So in this case, the audiobook loses a ½ star instead of gaining one... ( )

When I was growing up, my companions were Karl May, Mayne Reid and Emilio Salgari. Their tales of adventure made me a reader in a lot of ways. Rafael Sabatini should have been in that list but the Bulgarian edition was in 4 hardcover volumes, with white covers (so not books you want to carry in a backpack) and they looked a bit more like the books I was not ready for yet (that changed one summer when I decided to investigate and discovered Captain Blood but I never read any of them more than once as I was doing with the other 3 authors. Add another year and I discovered Science Fiction and the rest as they say is history).

What I did not appreciate back then is how much closer Sabatini was keeping to the actual history compared to the other 3. I did not care really - I was reading them for the adventures and it took me awhile to start looking at novels for their historical background.

The story starts in 1685 in England during the last acts of the Monmouth Rebellion. Peter Blood, an ex-soldier and current doctor, decides to behave like a human being (and a doctor) and helps an wounded man. Unfortunately for him, the man is a rebel and the current laws make Blood a rebel as well so he is arrested and eventually shipped to Barbados as a slave (which may or may not have been an improvement - as he tells the reader, had he been tried a day earlier, he would have been executed). As it is, he ends up in the hands of one of the English governors who believe everyone else to be under them. Peter Blood finds his way - he may be a slave but he is also a doctor and he even falls in love. Then the Spanish show up, things get a bit complicated and he ends up a captain of a pirate ship and his adventures continue at sea before ending up back on Barbados for the end of the novel - although not in a way anyone expects. And I am happy that Sabatini did not decide to give our captain a fairy tale ending - it would not have fit the narrative. He did leave it open enough though.

The novel works both as an adventure novel and as a historical one (if you don't have issues with reading about the battles). It ties together the story of England between the Monmouth Rebellion and the Glorious Revolution 3 years later and the story of the Caribbean islands exploitation and the pirates that spawned at the time. Most of the characters are invented by some are the real people who lived and even most of the invented ones are based on actual people - changed, merged, split or otherwise manipulated but the read like 17th century people. I read a non-fiction book about the Caribbean pirates a few years ago (Buccaneers of the Caribbean: How Piracy Forged an Empire by Jon Latimer) so I had a bit of a background which helped but Sabatini's story covered the same ground in a lot better way in places despite being fiction. Which does not happen often.

Sabatini never continued the story - what is considered a continuation by some is actually a set of stories set during the pirate years of Peter Blood. That leaves the whole Peter Blood story spanning a bit over 3 years (although we hear a lot about the years before that as well). And despite the somewhat open (or unhappy if you want to call it that) ending, I think that was the right choice. ( )

Audiobook version narrated by Robert Whitfield is very well recorded. I love the character of Captain Peter Blood. His Irish wit is humorous and he is a very likable character. This book is very reminiscent of Alexander Dumas' books. ( )

Where have all the good men gone?!

Our protagonist Peter Blood is definitely a product of the the late 19th and early 20th centuries: a too-clever and too-handsome gentlemen rogue whose only real weakness is his need to be liked.

And the thing is: I welcome this stoicism— as I consume today’s media in other forms where we are swimming in morally ambiguous anti-heroes, I find myself beaten down by the onslaught of grey- or sepia-toned worlds. Peter Blood’s unyielding need to be liked by a woman, and his unwavering patience in his mission of making “evil” men-in-power pay is refreshing. Even if it might seem boring in summation.

Captain Blood is a fast-paced swashbuckling adventure that doesn’t waste a lot of time on things that don’t matter. You’re not stuck learning about the politics of the 17th century or how a frigate operates for whole chapters— at least, you’re not being forced to work for it— the narrator of the story is there to help you bridge those gaps within the course of his re-telling. ( )