Brief Historical Note

Readers who are interested in pirates, square-riggers, the early eighteenth century, and ancient Kerma may be interested to know that my instructions in writing this novel were to “stick to historical fact, unless it conflicts with established Pirates of the Caribbean continuity.” I made a faithful effort to do this.

The city of ancient Kerma really existed, located close to the third cataract of the Nile, in the country now called Sudan. The legend of Zerzura is a “real” legend, though the magical island lying off the coast of Western Africa is my own creation.

For the purposes of the story, I also created the island of New Avalon, because I needed an island in that spot, and none of the existing ones were big enough or had the rich soil needed to grow sugarcane.

For information about how real pirates lived, fought, and sailed, I recommend the following books: The Sea Rover’s Practice and The Buccaneer’s Realm, by Benerson Little, Under the Black Flag by David Cordingly, and The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Pirates, by Gail Selinger with W. Thomas Smith, Jr.

At this point I have a whole shelf of pirate books, but those four were the ones I found myself using the most consistently.

—Ann C. Crispin