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3.78 AVERAGE
3.78 AVERAGE
An interesting book about a thirteen year old girl who had lived in the lap of luxury and is thrown into the company of mutinous sailors. I always loved tales of the high sea as a kid, and this one is well-told.
I had tried several times to read this one over the years, and could never finish it. I just couldn't get past the part where Charlotte runs to warn the captain about the mutiny, because I could see that that was such a horrible idea that I just didn't want to know what the fallout was going to be. I'm glad I forced myself to finally finish, though, because I quite like the rest of the book.
I do have some criticisms (of course!) For one, I've read several historical fiction books about sailors, and while Captain Jaggery is certainly mad by the end of the story, his initial actions did not seem to me to be that far from what would be accepted, even expected, of a captain in that era. Charlotte is horrified by Jaggery's flogging of Zachariah, and we as readers are clearly meant to share that horror, but I could never quite forget that the entire crew had intended to murder the captain in cold blood as part of an extended revenge plot. Yes, the guy is a jerk and there isn't much the crew can do in terms of lawful justice, but to then put down as one of his crimes the fact that he reacted to attempted murder with punishment seems a little off.
I also had to just put aside my doubts about whether the captain would have let Charlotte do any of the crew work in the first place. What did he think was going to happen when she got home and told her father all about the voyage? He should have been reasonably confident that Charlotte's father would have backed up all of his actions concerning the mutiny and dismissed Charlotte's concerns as the sentimentality of a young girl. But allowing her to be part of the crew ...there's no way there wouldn't have been a harsh backlash against that. I guess he'd been hoping that she would fall and kill herself, but even there, I doubt he could keep the crew silent forever, there would be repercussions eventually. It makes a lot more sense to just confine Charlotte to her room "for her safety" for the rest of the voyage.
The ending was pure wish fulfillment, and annoyed me greatly. I did like that her parents have a Victorian response to everything that happened, but they are the only ones who do. There is no way a crew of sailors would have been thrilled to get a girl back on the ship again, if for no other reason that because women were considered bad luck. Never mind that at 13 she'll start turning into a woman soon, with all of the many problems that could create in an enclosed environment. Never mind that her father is one of the owner's of the ship and is not going to be pleased when he figures out where she is.
I do have some criticisms (of course!) For one, I've read several historical fiction books about sailors, and while Captain Jaggery is certainly mad by the end of the story, his initial actions did not seem to me to be that far from what would be accepted, even expected, of a captain in that era. Charlotte is horrified by Jaggery's flogging of Zachariah, and we as readers are clearly meant to share that horror, but I could never quite forget that the entire crew had intended to murder the captain in cold blood as part of an extended revenge plot. Yes, the guy is a jerk and there isn't much the crew can do in terms of lawful justice, but to then put down as one of his crimes the fact that he reacted to attempted murder with punishment seems a little off.
I also had to just put aside my doubts about whether the captain would have let Charlotte do any of the crew work in the first place. What did he think was going to happen when she got home and told her father all about the voyage? He should have been reasonably confident that Charlotte's father would have backed up all of his actions concerning the mutiny and dismissed Charlotte's concerns as the sentimentality of a young girl. But allowing her to be part of the crew ...there's no way there wouldn't have been a harsh backlash against that. I guess he'd been hoping that she would fall and kill herself, but even there, I doubt he could keep the crew silent forever, there would be repercussions eventually. It makes a lot more sense to just confine Charlotte to her room "for her safety" for the rest of the voyage.
The ending was pure wish fulfillment, and annoyed me greatly. I did like that her parents have a Victorian response to everything that happened, but they are the only ones who do. There is no way a crew of sailors would have been thrilled to get a girl back on the ship again, if for no other reason that because women were considered bad luck. Never mind that at 13 she'll start turning into a woman soon, with all of the many problems that could create in an enclosed environment. Never mind that her father is one of the owner's of the ship and is not going to be pleased when he figures out where she is.