The Curse of the Golden Hinde

[Pinnington]

Fellow crew, I write from darkest London town about a book The Curse of the Golden Hinde. For pirates from 10 to 100, the tale follows young Wilf Pinnington back to the piratical Netherworld as he becomes cabin boy on the Devil's Advocate. I promise you a damned fine read as the scrivener behind it. In just one week, it has reached #3 bestseller in the UK Amazon children's historical fiction chart (exploration and discovery) but nobody in the US knows about it yet. It's time we put boy wizards in their place. I'll be following this thread with a keen eye.

 

[Thagarr]

Ahoy mate, welcome aboard.

Interesting... though I am a bit Leary of anything that is cursed after what Disney has done to Pirates of the Caribbean. More pirates is always better, Tweeted! Is this just a digital book at the moment? Or is there an actual physical copy on it's way at some point?

For those of you curious, you can find it on Amazon for $3.99 US.

A cannonball smashes through the church tower of a sleepy village...spies from a piratical underworld steal into the British Library for a 200 year old map.

England's last living pirate, Captain Jericho, recruits schoolboy Wilf Pinnington to enter the "Netherworld" as his apprentice cabin boy on The Devil's Advocate.

In the race to prevent the cursed statue of The Golden Hinde falling into the hands of the loathsome Captain Vane, Wilf faces tests of courage that would destroy grown men.

Among the heroes, villains and madmen he meets, there's Mundi - the Gandhi-like Master Navigator, the Phoenix Sisters - as beautiful as they are deadly and whose swordplay has no equal, Bose - First Mate and honest as the yardarm's long, crazed Gambrinus - a Professor of Explosions and the satanic Captain Vane - who reinvents the nature of evil.

The Curse of the Golden Hinde is a modern day Treasure Island, packed with action, suspense, daring and surreal humour. It's a tale written for any boy or girl who has felt the sea breeze ruffle their hair and wondered what adventure lies over the horizon.

 

[Pinnington]

Ahoy mate, welcome aboard.

Interesting... though I am a bit Leary of anything that is cursed after what Disney has done to Pirates of the Caribbean. More pirates is always better, Tweeted! Is this just a digital book at the moment? Or is there an actual physical copy on it's way at some point?

For those of you curious, you can find it on Amazon for $3.99 US.

Cheers Thaggar. Much appreciated. There is a real book but it's not at all Disney. Pretty sure they wouldn't have an attack on the Palace of the Spanish Inquisiton led by bunch of renegade pirates dressed as monks to free wrongfully imprisoned gitanos.
There's been a fair bit of research on the weaponry and sea craft too, although I'm sure your more scholarly crew mates will find one or two inconsistencies. (And please tell me so I may correct in later editions.) This site is a great discovery. Thank you.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Is it available for purchase as digital book on Google Play? I might be tempted to get it!

So you're actually the writer of the book yourself? That is truly very cool! Welcome to the forums indeed.

I'd be quite interested to hear from you on the research that you put to use in your book.
And perhaps some behind-the-scenes thoughts on your work would also be useful for an extra-special front page article.

 

[Pinnington]

Is it available for purchase as digital book on Google Play? I might be tempted to get it!

So you're actually the writer of the book yourself? That is truly very cool! Welcome to the forums indeed.

I'd be quite interested to hear from you on the research that you put to use in your book.
And perhaps some behind-the-scenes thoughts on your work would also be useful for an extra-special front page article.

Hi Pieter,
The main research resource was Defoe's A General History of the Pyrates. Indeed, you will find a Captain Vane in my book and there are two sisters very loosely based on Anne Bonney and Mary Read. For an authentic view of London in the 18th Century I am indebted to Catharine Arnold's superb book City of Sin: London. The weapons and ships detail I have sourced largely from the true treasure haul that is Wikipedia (please subscribe).

But I am surely not alone in being inspired by the great RL Stevenson's Treasure Island and Kidnapped. Also, in England as a schoolboy learning to read, I remember with great fondness the illustrated books of Sheila K. McCullagh (who died this summer) - Roderick The Red, Gregory The Green and Benjamin the Blue Pirate. Finally, my favourite poem from childhood is AA Milne's The Island: "If I had a ship, I'd sail my ship, I'd sail my ship, Through Eastern Seas..." That's when it started. Having my own boys then gave me an excuse to write something for them.

Does that answer your questions? By the way, assuming you may be Dutch, I should mention the sail-on role of a flat-bottomed Galliot from Rotterdam I named the Oranjeboom (after the beer).