This was a good book with a solid story, nothing wrong with the narrative, the characters were interesting, the plot was believable.
So why only 3 stars?
It's complicated. No, I mean literally. This story just jumps right in on the nautical terms. By the end of this book, I had some idea where certain things on a ship might be, and sometimes I even knew vaguely what they did, but it was only vague, as the terms were never formally defined. This is probably well and good, and I don't actually fault the author this. If I knew ANYTHING at all about seamanship, I suppose I would find it very aggravating to have to read through explanations of things that only the most dense land-grubber (<-that term was never used in this book) could possibly be confused about. Unfortunately, I am that land-grubber. I really really wish that my book was annotated in some way, so I could read to the side and figure out what the hell is going on. Lots of the strategy was hard to visualize, as I had no idea what was being manipulated.
If such a thing exist, I would really recommend some sort of supplement for this book's concepts. Actually, what I really recommend is getting a digital copy so that you can highlight terms that you are unfamiliar with, and then look them up without interrupting the story.
So yeah, not much of a review, I just didn't "get it" like I felt I might have. It was kind of like the feeling of watching a foreign comedian. You figure, they probably are funny, but you would have to be in on the cultural nuances and subtleties that make their act. Without the underpinning cultural context, it just isn't as good to you. Similarly, without being significantly more versed in the British royal navy during the beginning of the 18 century, or knowing anything about seamanship, the book felt a little out of reach to me. Still good, but I was just not "in" on it at too many points.