I know it was a different time but jfc. It's a great evil when white men are enslaved but Africans slaves are A-OK. And we're supposed to root for the ML to end up with the same love interest who profited off her uncle's horrific cruelty to the people be owned...

But yeah, other than that, it's a very fun and page turner of an adventure/swashbuckler/pirate novel.

At the beginning of this book, Peter Blood is sticking to his plan of abandoning his life of adventure and working as a physician. When he goes to tend the wounds of a rebel, he is arrested, subjected to a sham trial and sold into slavery. In this manner, Peter Blood is cast back into a life of adventure. He leads an escape, seizes a Spanish boat and is more or less forced into a life of piracy. Yet, despite his new role as buccaneer, the memory of Arabella Bishop causes him to retain his honor. What will happen when, in a chance re-meeting, his love is spurned by the woman enshrined in his heart?

After friends lent us an old black-and-white film of this story, I was excited to find it available for free on my kindle. I was even more excited to find that, for a while, the book and movie strictly match each other. Most of the dialogue in the movie is taken directly from the book. After a while, the book moves into adventures not shown in the movie. The third quarter of the story dragged slightly, but overall the story moved quickly with that distinct style many old-fashioned adventures are written in. While Captain Blood is completely unique certain aspects are comparable to both [b:The Scarlet Pimpernel|136116|The Scarlet Pimpernel|Emmuska Orczy|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1172075548s/136116.jpg|750426] and [b:The Prisoner of Zenda|54492|The Prisoner of Zenda|Anthony Hope|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1356449081s/54492.jpg|2661176].

The best romantic pirate novel. Is about as authentic as Pirates of the Caribbean (that is, not at all)-but far more sophisticated. A swashbuckling good read, if you can get through the really melodramatic bits to see how great this story really is.

Lots of action and daring heroic deeds and swashbuckling, very readable. A surprisingly even handed view of Catholics for its day, less so with the portrayal of black characters.

Never read a pirate story before, at least i don't think i have. Apparently this one is based on reality, or at least a version of reality that makes pirates out to be wronged gentlemen-buccaneers trying to survive despite the cruelty of the ruling classes. In turn Sabantini presents the aristocratic class as spineless half-wit bullies that can't help but cock things up...i loved it!