Oh man, I LOVED it. It was such a pleasure to read. A truly massive, sprawling historical epic that involves seemingly all facets of the time: there's adventure and romance and war and pirates and secret codes and metric tons of stuff about the economic workings, political machinations and conspiracies, ship building techniques, exploration of the natural sciences and so on of the day. The characters are great, historical figures are brilliantly implemented, the plot is incredibly intricate and exciting and it takes a loooong time to get through (it's almost 3000 pages total) so it's a world you get to truly inhabit and get to know. Plus there's enough pitched battles, narrow escapes, and rousing adventures to satisfy anyone. As far as modern historical fiction goes, this is arguably the most enjoyable I've come across. A real treat.
