The year is 1662.
Oliver Cromwell is dead, and England’s king has been restored to the throne.
But the restoration of the crown has not eradicated the uneasy tensions that ripple across England, where Cavalier and Roundhead attempt to coexist under the new monarch. Charles II presides over an uncertain court, where friends mingle with enemies and conspiracy lurks behind every door.
With rumours of treason brewing in the Scottish Isles, Charles II urgently needs a man he can trust to sail north and blow the conspiracy apart…no matter the cost.
And he knows just the man for the job.
Matthew Quinton is a loyal but inexperienced young sea captain from a family of staunch Royalists — his elder brother Charles, Earl of Ravensden, is one of the King’s closest friends.
Quinton’s life’s ambition has always been to receive a commission for the Life Guards. Captaining a ship is neither something he enjoys or is good at; his first command, the Happy Restoration, proved far less happy than tragic, as it was lost at sea with over one hundred souls aboard. Quinton himself only barely escaped with his life — thanks to a young man named Kit Farrell.
When the King informs Quinton that he has a new command, the Jupiter — obtained largely due to the fact that he is the only viable candidate who is not in the Mediterranean or Portugal — he swears that this time, he will complete his mission without loss of life or honour.
This means, at the advanced age of twenty-two, that he needs someone to teach him about the sea. For this, Quinton turns to Kit Farrell; in return, Matthew will teach the illiterate sailor how to read and write.
With Kit’s help, Matthew must tackle the dangers of the voyage: suspicions of murder, a resentful Cornish crew, the flamboyant Captain Judge of the Royal Martyr, and the growing conviction that treason is not to be found in the wilds of Scotland, but much closer to home than anyone ever imagined…
‘Utterly impossible to put down…finely shaded characters, excellent plotting, gut-clenching action and immaculate attention to period detail… Superb’ — Angus Donald, author of The Outlaw Chronicles
‘Swashbuckling suspense, royal intrigue, and high seas naval action…an excellent series’ — Publishers Weekly
‘Hornblower, Aubrey and Quinton — a pantheon of the best adventures at sea!’ — Conn Iggulden
J. D. Davies was born in Llanelli, Carmarthenshire. Educated at Jesus College, Oxford, he is one of the foremost authorities on the seventeenth-century navy and has written widely on the subject, most recently in Pepys’s Navy: Ships, Men and Warfare, 1649-1689, which won the Samuel Pepys Award in 2009.
