Pirate Latitudes by Michael Crichton is a posthumously published novel. Apparently it was found completed in his estate. I'd argue against the completed part though. There was a complete plot, and it had all the earmarks of something waiting to be adapted into a blockbuster film as well, but it read full of cliche, cheap characters and cardboard cutout villains. Critics of Crichton will probably point to this as evidence that he was actually the author, but he's done better. I suspect that perhaps several more rewrites would have happened at some point if he had taken it to publication while alive.
In short this is an adventure story, heavy on cliched character and light on historical accuracy. It reads like a movie plot, with obvious villains and betrayals a-plenty. The basics are that the hero of the piece straddles the fine line between hero and villain, pirate and privateer, us vs them. Essentially to be on the side of the king, you could do know wrong unless you made the mistake of getting caught. To be on the side of the Spanish you were basically a pirate and cared not for the pleasantries of good behaviour etc. So it progresses as a lesson in 17th century seafaring racism with murder, politics, rape and prostitution all taking abundant time in the spotlight.
Unlike modern settings for novels, the crimes and attitudes are not judged or condemned, they just are. No commentary though leaves the reader with an uneasy feeling that the author either did not care or wanted to redress them via inattention. Somehow that approach seems too subtle for the broad brush the book is painted in.
A ripping yarn I guess, probably make a good movie with some re-writes and post-modern American moralising thrown in for good measure.
Next Week: Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka
(one of those books I always wanted to read )
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