Physician Peter Blood unknowingly tends to the wounds of English rebels -- and is sent, after trial, into slavery on the island of Barbados. But the authorities aren't prepared for a man of Blood's caliber: he and ends up leading a slave revolt, and what can he and his fellows do to make their way in the Caribbean? They turn to piracy. No ship on the Spanish Main is safe from the buccaneers of Captain Blood, gentleman pirate. . . .

At a young age, Rafael was exposed to many languages, living with his grandfather in England, attending school in Portugal, and, as a teenager, in Switzerland. By the time he was 17, when he returned to England to live permanently, he had mastered five languages. He quickly added a sixth language - English - to his linguistic collection. He consciously chose to write in his adopted language, because, he said, "all the best stories are written in English".