Birds Of Prey (The Courtneys)

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I am new to the genre of what my librarian termed "men's fiction," or "men's historical fiction" and I am unfamiliar as to whether these conventions are exclusive to Smith or the genre as a whole, but as a reader I feel that there is only so many "dark berry nipples" that a 550 pages book can contain. A breath-taking adventure from start to finish, Birds of Prey by Wilbur Smith is a fabulous addition to The Courtneys of Africa series. evil and adventure), using a touch of history while keeping a level of freshness, unexpected plot twists. The author appears to know his sailing (of which I am totally ignorant, but there is great care to give the reader elements of nautical life and ship terminology), his history, and as always is a world-class storyteller. No amount of scouring with even the strongest lyes could ever rid a slaver of her characteristic smell.

His young eyes, the keenest in the ship, had been posted there to catch the first gleam of distant sail in the rose of the new day. Hal had a glimpse of his adversary’s face, black and glistening, a cave of a mouth lined with huge square white teeth, the tongue as pink and curled as a leopard’s as he screamed. It is a prequel to the Courtney saga and follows the fortunes of Hal Courtney and is set in the 1660’s.Hal reached the end of the yard and without pause swung out onto the brace and slid down it until he was ten feet above the deck. This entry is set during the 17th century and does a great job of using English, Dutch, and Islamic history to move the story. While there is plenty of action in this story, the characters are often flat, unmotivated, and inconsistent.

As in all human experience, it is the interactions and the ties which make it interesting, be they the traditional ties of love, or ties of emnity after betrayal, or as is more normally the case, a mixture of the two - one transposing into the other. But a female general who gloriously leads a counterattack to achieve unprecedented fame for her people resigning her station to be with Hal?The payoff is rich, and Smith has penned a truly enjoyable tale that I almost feel would work better as an action film. The Lady Edwina was a ship of 170 tons burden, with an overall length of little more than 70 feet, but she carried a crew of a hundred and thirty men if you included those now manning the two pinnaces. He was as robust and broad-shouldered as a lad three years older, and long in limb – he already stood as tall as his father. By now he knew this southern sea so well; this broad highway of the ocean that flowed eternally down the eastern coast of Africa, blue and warm and swarming with life. Once they had been shackled to the ringbolts in the deck of the long narrow slave hold, they could not be released until the ship docked at the end of her voyage in the ports of the Orient.

Yet again i love Smiths ability to paint pictures of Africa in his words, and create complex characters. This legendary ruler of a vast and powerful Christian empire in the depths of the African continent had existed in the European mythology for hundreds of years.Sir Francis Courtney, his son Hal, and their crew are carried around the southern tip of the African colonies by the good ship Lady Edwinna, licensed to attack and seize the treasure-laden ships of the Dutch East India company.

Even from his seat at the masthead Hal could hear the pumps labouring in both vessels to lower the bilges. Whilst I certainly enjoyed this novel, it has a definite tendancy to veer into the two dimensional at times and I found the descriptions of our young leads virile manhood tiring by the end. I might not have helped me understand history or comprehend anything fundamental to my life, but I would say that reading Birds of Prey was fun and allowed me hours of enjoyable and dashing adventure within Wilbur Smith’s well written story. He saw the disturbance below it, the shimmer of scales and the seething of the surface as a shoal came up to the light. This is a seafaring quest around Africa; Sir Francis, the Captain, is captured and tortured by the Dutch.

Courtney's War is an epic story of courage, betrayal and undying love that takes the reader to the very heart of a world at war. I haven't read Assegai, the most recently published of their family saga which is set in WWI times, and now I wonder if I should. The Second Anglo-Dutch War is in full swing and the capturing of the Royal Charles and successful attack by the Dutch Fleet under Admiral Michiel de Ruyter is still painfully fresh in English memory.