Drake – Tudor Corsair

Name: Drake – Tudor Corsair
Rating: 4.19 (956 reviews)

by Tony Riches Book 1 in the The Elizabethan series.

First published 2020

Amazon

4.2(956)

Francis Drake begins as a Devon seaman looking for profit and advancement in an Atlantic world already shaped by Spanish imperial wealth. Voyages with his kinsman John Hawkins expose him to the Caribbean, violent competition and the treasure routes carrying silver across the Spanish empire. Drake turns privateering into a career of audacious raids, then attempts the greater feat of a circumnavigation whose success brings wealth, fame and a knighthood from Elizabeth I.

The novel follows the widening conflict between Elizabethan England and Philip II’s Spain from opportunistic raiding to open war. Drake’s circumnavigation, attacks on Spanish shipping and role against the Spanish Armada made him a national hero in England and a notorious corsair to his enemies. Riches also places his rise within the morally compromised Atlantic economy of the period, where exploration, commerce, slavery and state-sponsored predation overlapped. The result is both maritime adventure and a biography of the sailor who became one of Elizabeth’s most useful weapons.