Born of Tyranny: Port of Errors by Steve V Cypert

I was very excited to start this book. I love pirate stories. Even as I read through the, rather slow, start of the story, I still had high hopes. Soon my high hopes began to fail and confusion took over.

There are a lot of characters to keep track of. Some are introduced in flashback so there is also the confusion as to how the flashback characters fit into the current story. Some were orphans growing up and when they were auctioned off their names changed. As readers we are privy to the change but I still had to keep flipping back to keep track of the new name. It is also hard for an author to develop this many characters well. I had trouble connecting with the characters.

I was also confused as to the author's intended audience. The sentence structure, vocabulary and glossary at the end of the book, suggest a young audience but the level of graphic violence and sexual innuendo is much higher than I would be comfortable recommending for a child. Privateers of the time were brutal and the author is likely accurate in his portrayal but some things are better glossed over in the presence of young ears.

There is some appealing dark humour in the book that was appropriate, and many of the characters are eccentric and fun. I loved the introduction of young Edward Teach (pirate lovers will better know him as Blackbeard). He just wouldn't take 'no' for an answer!

Arguably, the best part of the book was the ending. Everything came together nicely and yet left room for more. As this is the first book in the 'Born of Tyranny' series, we know there are other adventures in the offing. Hopefully now that the stage is set and the characters fleshed out, future books in the series will move at a faster pace.

/5

Character Development          3

Editing                                     5

Sex                                          1

Violence                                  4

Romance                                 0

Readability/Flow                    3