KYDD
By Julian Stockwin
Coronet (Hodder & Stoughton) - November 2001
ISBN 0340794747 PB
Historical Fiction
1793, At sea just off Britain and France

Reviewed by: Rachel A Hyde, MyShelf.com
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The majority of sea stories deal with life among the officers, so Julian Stockwin's debut novel in a new series will come as a refreshing change as it deals with life before the mast, and the life of a pressed man at that. Thomas Paine Kydd (nothing to do with Captain Kydd) is a wig-maker from Guildford who is seized by the press gang while enjoying a drink in his local. He finds himself aboard the 98-gun ship of the line Duke William and the lowest of the low, a Landsman. But he gradually comes to find something to enjoy in the life and begins to turn into a seaman who can climb the rigging and drink his grog with the best. But there is the seditious Stallard, enigmatic Renzi and unpleasant Tyrrell to contend with as well as the sheer terror of his first bloody battle and the lure of mutiny and escape.

This is a most enjoyable book that, instead of blinding the reader with science and then flying off into adventures, actually describes what daily life was like aboard a ship in "the golden age of warfare under sail". It would even be a good book to read first for anybody who has never read a sea story before and is put off by endless series and complicated terms that aren't explained. Stockwin doesn't draw a diagram of the ship but it is almost as if he has done so, and by the end of the book, I felt that I had served my apprenticeship as Landsman just like Kydd! I've read books with more battles and adventures in them, but in this novel, you can almost hear the creak of the timbers and smell the tar and the bilges…wonderfully evocative and excellent beginning to a new series.

Check out Julian Stockwin's website at www.julianstockwin.com