Untold: The Race of the Century - Official Trailer - Netflix

 

I read Pirate Hunters!

I'm still here, don't write me off!

It has just been a busy start to the year and I haven't been blogging at all really, but I still exist. And I just finished an awesome book that I would recommend to any and all pirate buffs.

I posted back in 2024 a link to Amazon for this book, 

see post here

and I started reading it at the beginning of the year. And boy am I glad I did, what a fun book to read. Well, maybe not all fun, I was pretty stressed out while reading it as I urged on these divers and shipwreck lovers in their quest to find the Golden Fleece. It isn't as easy as following an X marked on a map, it cost almost a fortune just to maintain equipment, and included trips to New York and Spain to visit libraries with maritime records dating back to the 1600's. 

The Golden Fleece was a pirate ship captained by Joseph Bannister, a pirate I had never heard of until now, which went down in the shallows off the coast of the Dominican Republic in 1686. 

Anyway, not to give any spoilers let me just end it with saying if you are looking for an enjoyable read about some treasure obsessed adventurers this is a good one. 

The Pirate's Wife: The Remarkable True Story of Sarah Kidd

(from Amazon)

"[A] striking, thoroughly researched depiction of just how much persistence and inventiveness it took for a woman in Colonial America to retain security and dignity over the course of her life." —Christian Science Monitor

Few know that Captain Kidd, one of the most notorious pirates to ever prowl the seas, had an accomplice, a behind-the-scenes player who enabled his plundering and helped him outpace his enemies. That accomplice was his wife, Sarah Kidd, whose extraordinary life is a lesson in reinvention and resourcefulness. Twice widowed by twenty-one and a successful New York merchant in her own right, Sarah secretly aided and abetted her husband, fighting alongside him against his accusers. Marshaling in newly discovered primary source documents, historian and journalist Daphne Palmer Geanacopoulos reconstructs Sarah’s extraordinary life, uncovering a rare example of the kind of life that pirate wives lived during the Golden Age of Piracy. This landmark work in women’s history weaves together the personal and the epic in a sweeping story of romance and adventure.

About the author

Daphne Palmer Geanacopoulos is a historian, journalist and author of THE PIRATE'S WIFE: THE REMARKABLE TRUE STORY OF SARAH KIDD (Hanover Square Press, an imprint of HarperCollins) and THE PIRATE NEXT DOOR: THE UNTOLD STORY OF EIGHTEENTH CENTURY PIRATES' WIVES, FAMILIES AND COMMUNITIES (Carolina Academic Press). She has published over 40 articles in newspapers and magazines. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, and many other publications. As a regular contributor to The New York Times Syndicate’s “Lifebeat” column her stories were published both nationally and internationally. She writes on a variety of subjects, including maritime history, business, science, health, fitness, education, museums, parenting, philanthropy, and lifestyles and trends. 

A former Legislative aide to a U.S. Congressman, she holds a Doctor of Liberal Studies degree and a Master of Liberal Studies degree from Georgetown University. She also holds a Masters degree in Business Administration from The George Washington University. During her studies at Georgetown University she focused her research and writing on issues concerning women, families and communities with a special focus on pirates of the eighteenth century.

She first became interested in pirates while writing an article in 2002 for The New York Times “Museums” Special Section about the Whydah Pirate Museum in Provincetown, Massachusetts. For the last fifteen years she has conducted extensive original research on pirates and their wives in archives in London, Washington, New York, Rhode Island and Massachusetts. She developed a more complete and nuanced history of piracy, and discovered that the lives of pirates, while indeed colorful, were often quite different from those of their literary and cinematic counterparts. 

link to Amazon