If you like Patrick O'Brian and Bernard Cornwell, you will love this exciting, action-packed maritime adventure from bestselling author James Nelson. "A master both of his period and of the English language" -- PATRICK O'BRIAN"Brilliant...Readers will gladly be swept along by a wonderful plot" -- PUBLISHERS WEEKLY"Don't just buy this one to see if you like it, get the three at once and cancel any engagements for the next several days." -- ***** Reader review"Read it far too quickly" -- ***** Reader review"Superb" -- ***** Reader review********************************************************WHEN THE PAST THREATENS TO CATCH UP WITH HIM, CAN HE MUSTER THE STRENGTH HE NEEDS? When Thomas Marlowe decides to renounce his life as a pirate - and keep it a secret, he uses the bounty he has amassed to purchase a fine Virginia plantation from a beautiful young widow, Elizabeth Tinling.While defending her honour, he kills the favourite son of one of the colony's most powerful families. But in a clever piece of manoeuvring, he manages to win command of the Plymouth Prize, the colony's decrepit guardship, and is charged with leading the King's sailors in battle against the cutthroats who infest the waters off Virginia's shores.A threat from his illicit past appears, however, as an old pirate enemy plots to seize the colony's wealth, forcing Marlowe to choose between losing all - or facing the one man he fears.The Guardship is the first book of the Brethren of the Coast trilogy. Marlowe's story continues in The Blackbirder.