“Told entirely through dialogue, this quirky tale of period pirate wannabes makes a jeu d'esprit of the privateer life even as it baldly de-romanticizes it.”
“A strange and nastily beautiful book.”
“A jeu d'esprit of the privateer life.”
“Beautiful and arresting writing.”
“An important contribution to American letters.”
“This book does not shiver, does not waiver, does not thin, and reading it is to see how our brightest and best writers can stretch beyond what we think realistic or probable on the page.”
“I wanted the reader to feel as if he were listening through some temporal fold that physics is always promising that would allow him to overhear voices in the 18th century.”
Trailer
Synopsis:
Pirate Talk or Mermalade is a novel in voices about two brothers who meet a mermaid, fall into pirating, and end up in the Arctic.