Booty: Girl Pirates on the High Seas

By Sara Lorimer and sara-lorimer

Book Overview

A treasure trove of high adventure and bad behavior, Booty tells the all-true tales of real women pirates who prowled the seas from the 9th to early-20th centuries in search of easy prey and easy profit. Raiding ships, boozing, brawling, and looting, they struck terror in the hearts of men from the Mediterranean to the South China Sea to the rivers of New York. Meet Rachel Wall, who traded her devout religious upbringing for "lewd and wicked company"; Cheng I Sao, who led a fleet of 2,000 ships and made her men drink cocktails of wine and gunpowder; Mary Read, who killed one pirate for the love of another; and Sadie the Goat, who headbutted her victims before fleecing them of cash. Their exploits and those of many more swashbuckling women fill these pages, along with salty illustrations and an informative look at the finer points of pirate life (grog, flogging, fashion, and more). Arrrrr.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0811832376
• ISBN13: 9780811832373
• Release Date: January 2002
• Publisher: Chronicle Books
• Length: 112 Pages
• Weight: 0.89 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 1.0" x 1.0"

Customer Reviews

Booty-licious!

I loved this book and read it a few hours. It gives a very quick biography or a dozen or so female pirates throughout history, accompanied with some great, colorful illustrations. I really like the pictures. It is not a serious or scholary book on the subject, but rather a fun and campy look at a bit of history. I'm not so sure how accurate the accounts are, but it is an entertaining read none the less. I would recommend this book for highschoolers as a way to introduce them to and spark some interest in interesting characters from the past. The author includes a list of further reading at the end of the book if you find your are further interested in reading up on pirates.

What a gem!

This book is a smart read for femmes of all ages and genders, and the illustrations are too, too fabulous! The cover art alone is worth the price.

Great book on an unusual subject

This book is a lot of fun, on a subject that doesn't get as much attention as it should. Piracy is a good career for a girl, too! For a terrific adult book on the subject, I would also recomend The Sweet Trade by Elizabeth Garrett.

Escape to the High Seas

As kids, many of us daydreamed of running away and becoming pirates, girls too. But, in the days when Jolly Rogers flew, were there pirate women? In her lively debut work, author Sara Lorimer answers yes, there were and "these women were real pirates who led lives just as adventurous and colorful as the male counterparts." Lorimer's well-researched book, which cites from a wide array of sources including a book of Danish history dating from the thirteenth century, relates both facts and lore from the lives of eleven pirate women including the famous Mary Read and Anne Bonny and lesser knowns such as Rachel Wall. Humor and wit pervade each chapter's recounting. With the added pleasure of Susan Synarski's illustrations, BOOTY pays off as a reader's ticket to escape to the high seas.

Escape to the High Seas

As kids, many of us daydreamed of running away and becoming pirates, girls too. But, in the days when Jolly Rogers flew, were there pirate women? In her debut work, author Sara Lorimer answers yes, there were and "these women were real pirates who led lives just as adventurous and colorful as the male counterparts." Lorimer's well-researched book, which cites from a wide variety of sources like a work Danish history dating from the thirteenth century, relates both facts and lore from the lives of eleven pirate women including the famous Mary Read and Anne Bonny and lesser knowns such as Rachel Wall. Humor and wit pervade each chapter's recounting. With the added pleasure of Susan Synarski's illustrations, BOOTY pays off as a reader's ticket to escape to the high seas.