Edward Chupack

Got to admit, I was disappointed by this. Why? Mainly because of this part of the back-of-book author's note:

"I could not have written an original novel had I incorporated large swaths of Stevenson's classic in my book. I could also not have satisfied the many, many lovers of Treasure Island if I did not include characters from that classic. I therefore used some of the characters from Treasure Island, changed their dispositions, placed them in different circumstances, and sent them on a different quest."

Fie on you, sir! If there's anything you proved in writing this book, it's that you COULD write an original novel...because you did. To call this book "the last testament of the infamous pirate Long John Silver" (phrasing admittedly probably written by the publisher) is false advertising of the grossest kind. There is almost nothing in here that ties the book to Stevenson's classic other than a few names, which in all honest does more discredit to the story than anything else. At least, in my opinion.

There are only two reasons I can see for keeping the tie to Treasure Island: first and foremost, marketing. People who love the original would obviously want to read this. Would they if there wasn't that tie? Hard to know. When I bought the book, I was trying not to buy any books published before 2013, which would have disqualified this 2008 book. I'm a huge fan of ships, seas, and swashbuckling, so it's very possible I would have held onto the book. Then again, maybe not.

The only other reason to keep the characters the same instead of striking out on his own is the plot, which could have been fixed relatively easily. We're not told much about Jim Hawkins because we're expected to know who he is already; this wouldn't have been difficult to change.

Basically, this book disappointed me because the author couldn't make up his mind between whether he was writing fanfiction or not. I would say that, in his defense, this book was published before the fanfiction publishing craze took off, but historically no one's been shy about publishing fanfiction of works in the public domain. Chupack didn't have to dance around newer works, the way Gregory Maguire did when he wrote [b:Wicked|37442|Wicked The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (The Wicked Years, #1)|Gregory Maguire|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1437733293s/37442.jpg|1479280], so there's really just no satisfactory explanation beyond marketing for why he didn't simply rename all his characters and cut ties with the original.

Fanfiction is a crutch that many writers use to hone their talents. Many published writers have thrown aside the crutch and run off into originality, probably thinking that it's a sign of weakness or lack of talent. Many, however, have embraced the crutch and made it their own, fashioning it into something so delightful and new even in its referral to the original that it becomes a part of them--like the original Silver's deadly crutch or Disney's Treasure Planet's cyborg limbs.

So my problem with this book is that the crutch is so obvious and suggests some sort of shame: Chupack and his editor didn't embrace Treasure Island enough to make this a proper ode to the original or a sensible alternative universe. But they also didn't seem to trust the author--or, let's face it, this version of the titular character--to support a completely original work. Which is a terrible shame (to quote Tim Curry's Silver), given how much I enjoyed the story, the style, and the telling. I got as far as the last two chapters still waiting for Silver's lie to unravel, for the connection to the original Treasure Island to be exposed in a clever way that we couldn't help but love Silver for (that was, after all, a key part of what made him so dangerous). Having been told that this was Silver's story, my eagerness for the "a clef" part of the book took away from my satisfaction over what would have otherwise been a very satisfying reveal indeed.

I really wish there were half stars we could give. I don't quite want to give this one three, but I don't want to give it two either. I'm going with three just because I don't want GoodReads to think I don't like pirate stories.

As a standalone, Silver holds up pretty well--as I said, it wouldn't have been hard to make this its own book. In fact, Captain Flint is inexplicably recast as Black John, or so I presume. Clearly someone at some point thought renaming the characters might work well.

My favorite parts were Silver's interactions with other characters: With Mullet, with Mary, with Edward Peach. That's why I'm here after all: to watch Silver be his charming, conniving island unto himself.

My least favorite part was the endless repetition of the clues to the island. For all they were repeated over and over again, I never did understand how anyone figured them out, they were so random and obscure. I didn't even try to figure out the mystery, though the cover copy seemed to imply that it should have been possible. There were too many red herrings, too many leaps that seemed more like guesswork, that ultimately the endless repetition was more annoying than anything.

Finally, one last disappointing aspect of the book was the astounding lack of diversity. One of the best things about reading books about pirates is that they were such (relatively) progressive little microcosms: race (and sometimes gender) meant nothing if you could hold your own in battle, ships were relatively democratic, the injured were fairly compensated for their sacrifices, and there were even formal partnerships between people of the same sex. This book's diversity consists of: two captive women who aren't around long before they are back offstage and thoroughly fetishized , the plucky, independent one of whom is ultimately raped and forced to bear her rapist's child as a result; men from different parts of *England* (was Ireland or Scotland even mentioned?); a mentally handicapped person treated like a subhuman beast; and a Jewish man who was really the only diverse character worth talking about. Even Silver's famously missing leg was written out of this book!

So yeah, while I did like a good pirate adventure story and appreciated all the new vocabulary I learned with a delightfully untrustworthy narrator, there were definite ways that this could have been a better book. Glad I read it, but it's another one for the charity shelf.… (mer)

When Long John Silver writes his final testament, a history of his years at sea pursuing the treasure, he warns you right in the title that there's a "goodly amount of murder". Man, he doesn't lie.

This was a fascinating autobiography of a fictional dastard, blackguard, scoundrel, and all-round murderous motherless son of the sea. Pursuing a treasure for decades, goaded on by clues in a Bible -- including the word "BLOOD" written in red ink -- Silver finds time to take command of a ship, woo a woman, and make hostages of those that might, for now, be of more use to him alive than dead.

Also, he's got time for murder.… (mer)