Title: The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi
Author: Shannon Chakraborty
Rating: 4/5

Are there LGBTQ+ characters? Yes; the main character is straight, but two major characters are part of the rainbow spectrum. One is a gay man, and another is a trans man. There may be others (one character may or may not be asexual or a lesbian) but that isn’t explicit in the text.

Brief summary / book review: Amina al-Sirafi is a retired pirate. She’s got a daughter, a quiet little hovel by the sea that’s breaking down, and some family that’s close-ish by, close enough for her to visit but not so near that they bother her.

But her piratical days are firmly behind her. She’s not just retired, she’s firmly off the map, where nobody can find her.

Or so she thought.

In a nutshell, a (very wealthy) grandmother hires Amina to find her missing granddaughter, who was (allegedly) kidnapped. Adventures ensue, both of the nautical and supernatural variety: She has to get the gang back together, find her old ship, mend broken relationships, deal with the complicated feelings that arise when her estranged husband comes back in the picture, find the missing girl, rescue said girl, defy supernatural birds and leviathans, etc etc etc.

Chakraborty’s storytelling is vivid, the plotting/pacing brisk, the action well-explained, and there’s tons of great humor throughout. In short, this is a very solid book that appeals to fans of things like Pirates of the Caribbean or wished that the Master & Commander series had a few more demons and fallen gods.