Synopsis
At first he had protested against the extravagance of the entertainment. But his protests had been laughed aside with good-humoured scorn. His hostess knew a gentleman when she saw one, he was assured, and knew how a gentleman should be entertained. Unsuspicious of the designs upon him, he never dreamed that the heavy debt he was incurring was one of the coils employed by this cunning huntress in which to bind him. -from "Chapter 1: The Hostess of the Paul's Head" Often spoken of in the same breath as Robert Louis Stevenson and Alexandre Dumas, Rafael Sabatini wrote thrilling tales of swashbuckling derring-do that were tremendous bestsellers in his day and have delighted generations of readers since. This 1922 novel, set in Reformation-era England, follows the misfortunes and misadventures of Randal Holles, a former soldier adrift without a war to fight... though the one threatening to erupt with Holland may be his grim salvation. Replete with intrigue, kidnapping, regicide, and plague, this is a captivating must-read for fans of adventure fiction. Novelist RAFAEL SABATINI (1875-1950) was born in Italy but traveled extensively throughout Europe as a child and eventually settled in England. His best-known works are The Sea Hawk (1915), Scaramouche (1921), and Captain Blood (1922).
Présentation de l'éditeur
London 1665 is no place for Randal Holles, a former soldier in Cromwell’s army, now that the monarchy has been restored and the exploits of the Republicans are being condemned in the highest degree. Holles, desperate for an escape from his hopeless situation and almost certain execution, sees no option but to accept the Duke of Wellington’s rather dubious commission - to abduct a famous actress and bring her before him. However, as events take an unexpected turn, Holles is presented with the opportunity to be reinstated to his former glory. Rafael Sabatini was an Italian/British writer of novels of romance and adventure. He wrote short stories in the 1890s, and his first novel came out in 1902. It took Sabatini roughly a quarter of a century of hard work before he attained success with Scaramouche in 1921. This brilliant novel of the French Revolution became an international best-seller. It was followed by the equally successful Captain Blood in 1922. All of his earlier books were rushed into reprints, the most popular of which was The Sea Hawk from 1915. Sabatini was a prolific writer; he produced a new book approximately every year. While he perhaps didn’t achieve the mammoth success of Scaramouche and Captain Blood, nonetheless Sabatini still maintained a great deal of popularity with the reading public through the decades that followed. The public knew that in picking up a Sabatini book, they could always count upon a good read, and his following was loyal and extensive.
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