Weekly Reader: Sailing by Orion's Star (The Constellation Trilogy Book 1) by Katie Crabb; Engaging Seagoing Adventure About Piracy and Slavery

 

Weekly Reader: Sailing by Orion's Star (The Constellation Trilogy Book 1) by Katie Crabb; Engaging Seagoing Adventure About Piracy and Slavery

By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews

Spoilers: What's better than reading the next volume of a great series? Reading the first volume of a new great series. Here we have one.

Sailing by Orion's Star is the first volume of Katie Crabb's Constellation Trilogy. It is a high seas adventure involving pirates, slavery, and makes some great commentary about racism, sexuality, and what it really means to stand against deplorable institutions and become a hero.

In 17th century Jamaica, Ajani Danso and Abeni escape from a slave and prison ship getting past a young seaman, Nicholas Jerome. They end up on a pirate ship, eventually becoming Captain and Quartermaster of their own ship. Meanwhile, Jerome was removed from his old position and has been hired by Captain Michel Delacroix, a kind captain who treats Jerome like a younger brother. Jerome bonds not only with Delacroix but also the Captain's son, Rene and Frantz, Rene's best friend. 

As Rene and Frantz mature, their friendship intensifies and they become at odds with Jerome's and Delacroix's inaction with and involvement in the slave trade. 

There are so many great things about this book. In the first outing, Crabb hits it out of the park. There are plenty of moments of great sword fighting and narrow escapes that would be at home in a Pirates of the Caribbean film. There's a great moment when Danso and Abeni, fresh in their pirate careers, help slaves escape from a ship and give the escaped slaves the option of returning to their countries of origin or becoming part of their crew. This adventure helps cement their reputations as the Robin Hood and Maid Marian of the High Seas. 

Danso and Abeni's story is fascinating especially in the heart wrenching chapters when they reunite with family members lost in the slave trade. There is no doubt that despite being pirates, they are the good guys. They are fighting against a horrible dehumanizing institution that though legal was far from moral or ethical. 

The other interesting aspect to this story is the relationship between Rene and Frantz. It's fascinating watching them grow as innocent children to teens questioning and outright rebelling against something that they know is not right.

Rene starts as a naive kid who admires his father and thinks that he could do no wrong. He loves traveling with him and learning sword fighting from Jerome. He loves to hear about sea stories, tales of monsters, sirens, and of course pirates. He collects the stories in a book, including those of Danso and Abeni, Robin Hood and Maid Marian, unaware that they are closer to his father and his crew than he thought.

Rene also hates his abusive maternal grandfather who is the Governor of Kingston. He thinks he owns everything and everybody and isn't above striking and beating his own grandson into submission. No wonder Rene prefers the seas to land. 

There is another reason that Rene prefers his life on the seas: so he can be with Frantz. Compared to Rene's wealthy family with a French naval captain and his English wealthy wife, proper by 17th century standards, Frantz's family is very unconventional. He is the biracial son of Delacroix's first mate and best friend, Lt. Seymour and Chantal Mensah, a black woman from the Gold Coast. 

Unlike the Delacroixs who have to act like the correct couple even when they are at odds, Seymour and Chantal are really loyal and in love with each other but laws prevent them from being together. It's a truly heartbreaking cruel moment when Seymour and Chantal are separated forever but it intensifies Frantz and Rene's friendship as Rene tries to be the substitute family that Frantz needs. 

 The governor seeks a few times to personally attack or sell Frantz because of who he is. Delacroix turns a blind eye and Astra, his wife, only lets her real thoughts known in secret. Rene and Frantz are more upfront and are argumentative against Frantz's and the other slave's mistreatment. If the old song is right that children must be taught carefully to hate, Rene and Frantz are taught carefully to love. And love they do.

In fact, as the two boys become teenagers, their friendship evolves into romance. They become a duo who would do anything to stay together. Their convictions against slavery cause them to see the people around them, especially Delacroix and Jerome, as participants in dehumanizing people around them. They want to escape and fight against slavery even if it means leaving everyone that they know behind and facing the unknown of the seas, perhaps towards a very famous crew of pirates.

The other interesting thing that Crabb does is shows how slavery dehumanizes everyone, those that are captive and those that are doing the catching and transporting. If the pirates are the good guys, then the navy and officials are the bad.

This is embodied in Delacroix and Jerome. Delacroix is at first portrayed as a loving father to his crew and to his son. He never exhibits corporal punishment towards anybody and while nonchalant about the slave trade absolutely will not transport them. His friendship, and at one time more, with Seymour keeps him grounded and steady, giving him something of a backbone. Astra also has a higher moral compass than her husband's. Even though she can't say what she feels aloud, she is able to help escaped slaves covertly. They and Rene's admiration keep Delacroix's darker feelings in check for a while.

Unfortunately, Delacroix loses those good influences one by one either by other's actions or his own. At first he is inattentive and ambivalent to slavery, not personally liking it but accepting it in the background. Then he compromises his morals under duress and threats of removal of power. He kowtows to the institution and participates in transporting slaves. This is an anguished moment when Rene no longer sees the hero that he once idolized but a weakling who would rather capitulate than fight against something that he knows is wrong.

Jerome is another character who changes for the worse. He is the first pov character in the book and is portrayed sympathetically during Danso and Abeni's escape. He is a minor sailor in over his head and has a family history of his own that he doesn't want to admit. He is half-Romany on his mother's side. That lineage could enslave or imprison him so he keeps it a secret. (One of the few redeeming moments that Delacroix has later in the book involves Jerome letting his guard down enough to tell the captain about his family and Delacroix still understands and accepts him). 

Jerome starts creating a surrogate family with Delacroix as his father and Rene as his brother. He enjoys the sword fighting lessons as much as Rene does and clearly sees Delacroix as the standard of someone he wants to be like. However, he too is caught between the standards of the day and his own morals. His reactions towards the slaves' mistreatment amounts to being glad that he doesn't have to go through it so he maintains silence.

Jerome also hates pirates because he sees them as irredeemable criminals regardless of their motives and also because he knows that he helped create Danso and Abeni's legend. His black and white views of piracy and slavery and adoration of the captain motivate him to turn his conscience off. He goes from being naive to a cold navy man who accepts commands no matter how harsh and violent they are. He becomes someone who left his conscience at the door and is the archetypal soldier, or sailor in this case, who is "just following orders." His descent into villainy is felt in the final pages as he actively rejects the good man he once was to become the hateful villain that he is becoming.

Sailing by Orion's Star is a great start to a tremendous series. If the second volume is like the first, there is some rough waters ahead for the characters, but the Reader will find some smooth sailing.