Perhaps the best yet! This is the fourth in the series. 

The French and a team of British traitors are building a new technology that will lay Britain’s shores open to invasion. Jacob Fletcher joins in a daring expedition, deep in enemy territory to destroy this monstrous machinery before it’s too late.

Author John Drake has a profound understanding of sailing as well as the ships, weapons, and tactics of the time. All of this is explained by Jacob Fletcher, the first person narrator in his Age of Sail, Cornwall dialect, but still in a way that even the most helpless landlubber can understand. This is part of the allure of the series for me as I am as much attracted to learning about the history, technology, and ways of the era as I am to a good, action-packed story. Fletcher’s voice is authentic and inviting, referring to us readers as “my jolly boys” and to himself as “your Uncle Jacob.”  I feel like I’m sitting with an old sea dog as he regales me with his salty yarns of an era gone by.

Jacob Fletcher is an exciting character who shares my own curiosity with the world around him. The story is great fun with multiple exhilarating climaxes that pay off everything in the end. Pay attention because nothing written is in vain as the story builds. All threads are neatly tied off.

The Fletcher Series uses the “found manuscript” trope. Drake claims he won Fletcher’s memoir in an auction and then filled in the antagonists’ parts of the story in third person from letters and news paper clippings. He even makes a character of the scribe who allegedly took the oral dictation from the aging Fletcher under the threat of physical violence if he omits or alters the way Fletcher describes events. This man, allegedly returned to the manuscript after Fletcher’s death and added notes usually mocking Fletcher or calling out his hypocrisy.

This is a great series for anyone who’s a fan of Jack Aubrey, Horatio Hornblower, or even Richard Sharpe. I’m looking forward to reading the next installment!

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