Celebrating International Women's Day: For the Love of a Pirate Book Review

 

I think this novel is appropriate for International Woman's Day (March 8th) since it helps the protagonist go from accepting her life as is, mundane and unfair, to knowing the power she holds within herself. No, it's not a fantasy novel with a woman who can accomplish the impossible with powers, gadgets, or talking animals. But it does have some spiritual awakening, so by the end, Kelly has the confidence and power to #choosetochallenge.    

You Should Read For the Love of a Pirate if...

• You love pirates, specifically Samuel "Black Sam" Bellamy
• You enjoy time-travel and reincarnations.
• You're psyched when spirits and ghosts are involved.

Want a short, spoiler-free review? Check out my review on Reedsy Discovery!

Summary 

For the Love of a Pirate by Laura Nelson introduces us to Kelly Hunter, your average woman who works a nine-to-five job for the State of Colorado. Working in the fraud section of the unemployment department, Kelly keeps to herself and has gotten used to staying in every night. She's lost her passion for life, which reflects back at her through her photos and the décor of her apartment. But when a friend sets her up on a blind date, Kelly enters the world of pirates, changing her life forever. As she learns about famous pirate Samuel "Black Sam" Bellamy, Kelly makes a connection through touching some of the artifacts and becomes aware of a guiding presence. She has strange dreams that thrust her into different times and dimensions. Kelly must save the lost souls of Bellamy's crew while protecting herself from a spirit that wants to take her body for revenge.

-- SPOILERS, HO! --

Characters

• Kelly Hunter: She is middle-aged and has had several relationships, but nothing that amounted to anything. Kelly lives with her two cats, likes to read and used to write. She didn't pursue a creative career since she need a job that paid the bills, but then she got stuck at her job, forgetting about her passions and lives life on auto-pilot.

• Peter Cornelius Hoof: He is part of Bellamy's crew. He was on one of the ships Bellamy captured, the Whydah. Peter and the rest of the crew on the Whydah got separated from Bellamy's ship and were caught in a storm that shipwrecked them. They managed to seek shelter and food from a village, but when one of them blabbed about being a pirate for Bellamy, Peter and the crew were arrested and later, executed. Peter and the crew's souls have remained in a purgatory for centuries. Peter is regretful for becoming a pirate.

• Olivier Levasseur: Well-known pirate Olivier ”La Buse” Levasseur (“the Buzzard”) lost everything when he was alive. As a spirit, he wants revenge and for his story to be rewritten because the historians were lazy, according to him. To get his revenge, Olivier needs a body and thinks he can trick Kelly into letting him possess hers (and eventually claim it as his own). Through her time-travelling dreams, he tries to seduce and capture her.

• Clemencia: She is a married friend of  Kelly's, but she is not that great of a friend, which is why she and Kelly are not close. Since she's gotten married, Clemencia feels the need to set Kelly up, tricking her into meeting men. When things don't work out with Dan and Kelly, Clemencia takes his side. 

• Dan: He is one of Clemencia's "cast-offs." When he's in both Clemencia and Kelly's presence, Dan displays good behavior. At the exhibition, he has a need for control and is impatient when things don't go his way. He is rude and inconsiderate. 

• Denise: She is one of Kelly's co-workers with whom Kelly starts to socialize throughout the book. Denise seems to be a better friend towards Kelly because she takes an interest in her life and the issues between her and David.

• David: He is Kelly's supervisor and known as "Spineless David" around Kelly's office. He is insecure and tries to build himself up through lies. He doesn't know what he's doing and is incompetent, blaming other people, especially Kelly, for problems even when there aren't any. 

*It's important to note that it is possible that I may have missed details or did not connect aspects together.

What I Liked

It's always nice to see parts of the author in their work. Kelly is a cat owner and does Tai Chi just like Nelson. It not only lets us see the person behind the story, but we feel as though Kelly is a regular human and, therefore, is relatable. 

The book opens up with a great hook where Kelly is trying to escape from a mysterious man in an old, dusty market. The story immediately transports the reader. 

The beginning chapters do a great job at introducing Kelly and her present life circumstances. I don't like Kelly's so-called friend Cordelia (which is probably intentional) since she tries to set up Kelly with her "cast-offs." I relate to Kelly in this regard. That kind of thing is not something I'd appreciate. The situation between Dan, Kelly and Cordelia shows the typical way dating seems to go: the first meeting is great, but then Dan gets weird when he and Kelly go on their first official date. I felt as though Dan was more of a tool for the author to get Kelly to the exhibit, but only because this is a story. I was glad to see Nelson brought Cordelia back into the story as a follow-up to the Dan storyline. And the conversation she and Kelly have shows that she isn't a great friend since she seemed to have taken Dan's side in the matter. 

I enjoyed the museum scenes because it's told as a real-life tour. It reminded me of many exhibits I've explored on school trips and with family and friends. 

I love time travelling stories and I was happy to see a Quantum Leap-ish vibe in the first few dreams/visions. It was cool to find out that Kelly was actually remembering her past lives. Reincarnation is another topic I love to read about. 

I thought it was a nice touch that Kelly goes to Ellen, a professional who connects with spirits and reads tarot cards. And she even helps Kelly get Peter and almost all of the other pirates to cross over. 

The title and synopsis could have lent itself to a steamy romance, but I was very happy to see that the love between Peter and Kelly was a transcendental love while Olivier tries to use lust to gain possession of Kelly's body.   

The fight scene between Kelly and Olivier at the end was thrilling, despite a qualm (see next section). I enjoyed the part where Kelly takes on the power of the tiger that we had seen in a previous dream of hers and Olivier, finally, gives up and flees. I could not wait for her to stick it to David (see next section for another qualm I have).

What I Didn't Like

A few chapters in, we have the narrator speak from Kelly's perspective and then a "man-spirit" is introduced. It was confusing because I wasn't sure who was speaking, Peter or a second spirit. And then a voice is introduced into the mix. I found it to be a lot to keep track of, as well as what each individual knows. The man-spirit speaks about his observations of Kelly, which demonstrates that he has been "haunting" Kelly for several years and learning from her television shows of how women treat men. We learn much later on that Peter was also "haunting" Kelly since she was young because he knew she was the one who would help him to cross over. The time travel aspect may also be a little confusing for readers, but time travel is always confusing! 

After a few dreams, Kelly starts speaking with a co-worker. She recounts her dreams about Peter and Denise does not have a realistic reaction, in my opinion. I found her to be empty as a character. She didn't show much emotion or opinion about Kelly's belief that the dreams were real, that she was hearing a voice, and that Kelly was travelling back in time. Denise seems to accept it all without question and offers advice. She doesn't act surprised or question Kelly's sanity.  

Not Enough Info or Too Much

During one of Kelly's dreams, a coven of witches perform a binding ritual on Peter, and Kelly has to save him. There are two things I don't like about this: 

1. Peter mentions earlier in the story about the binding and that it is done to remove his free will, but it is never explained as to who the witches are and why they want to bind Peter or any spirit for that matter. We get a glimpse of them in Kelly's dream, but they are never spoken about in detail.
2. Kelly saves Peter, but she saves him with the help of a guiding voice in her head, which is, I believe, her Guardian (Angel?) named Faleen. 

Having a Guardian in the story is great, but it takes away a lot of Kelly's power. I find it clashes with the ending where Kelly is suddenly able to fight and win against Olivier. I found she didn't really have enough training to deal with him since she was often guided by a voice.

Another instance where things are not explained is when Kelly is in the body of Peter's older brother, Leander. He leaves Peter and their father to explore the world with a friend, promising Peter that he will return for him when Peter is old enough. Kelly experiences life for a few days or weeks as Leander and sees how Leander and his friend die. She also witnesses their burial in unmarked graves in another land because no one knew who they were. So, Peter waits in vain for the return of his brother. At the end of the vision, Kelly returns to her body and speaks to Peter in her mind, saying she understands and forgives him. This is early on in the book, so I did not know what Kelly had realized nor did I understand what she was forgiving him for. Additionally, I thought that she had been Leander in a past life and Leander's promise to return to Peter was the promise Peter mentions in a previous dream, but this was not the case. It is only towards the end of the book that we see the promise in question is one Kelly makes as a time travelling spirit in Peter's past, but her future. (Alert: time-travel headache)

Several times, the historical and spiritual information are repeated, which is something I have not seen in novels before and I found it unnecessary. Either we are given information through Kelly's research, the pirate exhibition or a character, but to have one of those sources repeat information from one of the other sources seemed almost like a filler for the scenes or that the author was afraid the reader wouldn't remember the information.

With her new-found power, I was expecting a more eventful confrontation with her horrible supervisor. Kelly does have more confidence and backs up her statements with evidence to put David in his place, but that is all that happens. She just has the confidence and power to deal with him now and in the future. He doesn't get much of a comeuppance. He still has his job, he is still her supervisor, he is not obviously stunned by Kelly's change in character. I felt like it was anti-climactic after her final encounter with Olivier.

Conclusion

For the Love of a Pirate is an entertaining story that has many good aspects. The historical part is strong and is told as a story within a story. The characters and scenarios do get confusing because they are too similar (two spirits, two promises, etc.). The various dreams and visions were fun to experience and kept me reading because I wanted to find out where or who Kelly would be. I am overjoyed that everything was resolved at the end with the added bonus of Peter returning from crossing over to look after Kelly without fear of binding or anything bad happening to him. 

I recommend checking out the book because it's exciting and has a (mostly) satisfying ending. Find it and more about the Whydah pirates on Laura Nelson's website!

Check out my other book reviews in the library.

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