“[She was a] long-legged lass with freckled
skin, with fiery hair and a spirit to match. He had discovered her in the
bosun’s locker, intent on Barbados where she hoped to inherit her father’s
estate. Of course, there was nothing for
her there. Ah, but he had lost his heart
to her, not once but twice. And then she disappeared...”
Thus, the
first chapter in this, the third of Collison’s Patricia MacPherson historical adventure
series, reminds the reader of the beginning of a very strange saga. Back then, only
semi-protected by the young man who had found her stowed away and “had lost his
heart to her,” Patricia was forced by survive by her wits in a strange and
exotic land. Obviously, her options were limited — she could prostitute
herself, get married, or find a job, the last being almost impossible for a
young woman who was hampered by her youth, her sex, and her total lack of
qualifications.
The
inevitable marriage of convenience led to yet another solution — her kindly
husband, a ship’s surgeon, taught her enough of his medical skill for her to
make a living after his death . . . but only if she takes on the guise of a
man. And so Patricia MacPherson, girl-widow, metamorphosed into Patrick MacPherson,
sea surgeon.
By the time
this third book opens, Patrick/Patricia has progressed even
further, to the command of a ship in the Caribbean sugar trade, and has become
so masculine in thought and bearing that s/he often seems hermaphrodite. A
re-encounter with a beautiful Creole woman who helped her transform herself in
a male has tantalizingly Lesbian overtones.
Added to that, when faced with a maritime crisis, Captain Patrick
MacPherson rises to the challenge like an experienced master mariner. A very different crisis — delivering a baby by
Caesarean section — is a stark reminder of the problems of being a woman. But
then the reappearance of Brian Dalton — the same young man who saved her as a stowaway
in the very first book — tips Patrick/Patricia back into feminine mode, with
all the complications that thinking and feeling like a young woman brings to a “fellow”
in her strange situation.
But this
book is much more than a study of conflicting sexuality. The setting is 1765, when the American colonists
are in a ferment, roused to rebellion by duties and taxes imposed by a
rapacious English administration. Collison, who is as adept with the politics of
the time as she is with details of life at sea, handles this very well indeed.
Recommended to history buffs as an unusual, thought-provoking book that rings with
authenticity.
Another
triumph from Old Salt Press.
2 comments:
I'm thrilled that you have read and reviewed Rhode Island Rendezvous. In writing this third book I took some risks in exploring Patricia's motivations and you have appreciated the protagonists dilemmas and laid bare the themes of the series. Your reviews themselves make good reading, and I value that as well. A heartfelt thank you, Joan.
This is as as enjoyable as the earlier books but is, without doubt, the best in the series. And I was particularly interested by the appearance of a young boy who, by what would have seemed then to have been a very unlikely seqquence of events, was to end up in reality having his portrait on a national currency!
Post a Comment