Review: The Time Pirate

Rating: ★★★★½
As someone who reads a LOT of pirate books, I’m finding myself increasingly appreciative when an author contributes something truly unique to the genre. Standard pirate fare is well and good – I wouldn’t be doing this if it weren’t – but there’s always something special about being hit with the unexpected, or enjoying a pirate adventure far removed from the usual stomping grounds.

And no one does this better than Ted Bell, author of Nick of Time, and now its sequel The Time Pirate. Set in the early days of World War 2, Nick and his family reside on a strategically important island in the English Channel, which soon finds itself overrun by Nazi invaders. Nick, who was already established in the first novel to be a boy of admirable patriotism, daring, and creativity, does his best to defend his homeland, even going so far as to restore (and fly) his father’s WWI airplane and engaging in home-made bomb runs over a Nazi base-camp. Continue reading

Review: Nick of Time

Rating: ★★★★½
Nick of Time: an Adventure Through Time, by Ted Bell, is an aptly named book. Not only because its story involves time travel, but because the book itself seems like something from decades past. This is a proper boys’ adventure, full of ships, daring, submarines and heroes. Its very nature hails from an earlier time, making it a thrill and a delight to read.

The majority of the story takes place in England, in the years just prior to the full breakout of World War 2. Nick and his younger sister, Kate, reside with their parents on Greybeard Island – a quaint, sleepy sort of community that’s also full of history, reefs, and shipwrecks – and also happens to be strategically useful to the growing Nazi threat. It’s troubling times, made all the more so by the political bickering in Parliament regarding what to do about the impending danger, or if such danger even exists at all. Continue reading