Cinnamon and Gunpowder

April 1, 2013
Brown’s second novel follows up his prize-winning The Great Days with an early 19th-century tale of culinary seduction and swashbuckling antics, featuring characters who evoke the desperate ingenuity of Scheherazade and the hell-bent ruthlessness of Ahab. Owen Wedgwood is complacently preparing meals on the English seaside for a tea baron before the first Opium War, until the pirate Mad Hannah Mabbot braves a mission under the noses of bounty hunters and the Royal Navy to assassinate Wedgwood’s pirate-hunting boss. With Wedgwood held captive as Mabbot’s personal chef, Brown explores the mysteries of flavor with prose that any word-savoring foodie will delight in. Wedgwood gains our sympathy as he triumphs under the meager circumstances of a pirate’s galley, keeping himself alive with his cooking, but the book bogs down in handwringing over being party to villainy; diary entries give the chef’s delayed capitulation to the pirate’s life too much space. The story, the characters, and the ingenious battle scenes are far too colorful for moral dilemmas, which are made irrelevant when Mabbot is revealed as something of a humanitarian out to reset the wrongs of British imperialism. Agent: Laurie Fox, the Linda Chester Literary Agency.

March 1, 2013
A novel of pirates in 1819. Owen Wedgwood has a good job as a chef for Lord Ramsey when the latter's house is broken into by Hannah Mabbot, captain of the Flying Rose. For obscure reasons--obscure at least to Wedgewood, who narrates the story--she murders Ramsey in cold blood and has her pirate minion Mr. Apples kidnap Wedgewood, for she's thrilled to discover he's a cook; it's been difficult to have fine dining aboard a pirate ship. While distressed to have been captured, Wedgwood is even more upset to discover he's expected every Sunday to create culinary masterpieces from the thin gruel (as it were) of the ship's store, but somehow he manages. For example, he's able to create yeast bread by holding the rising dough against the warmth of his belly. At first, he ekes out acceptable meals, but as he's able to raid the ship's larder and occasionally get provisions in untoward ways, his Sunday meals become ever more creative and spectacular. Eventually, he turns out delicacies such as "Herring pate with rosemary on walnut bread. Tea-smoked eel ravioli seared with caramelized garlic and bay leaf...and rum-poached figs stuffed with Pilfered Blue cheese and drizzled with honey." But Captain Mabbot is not interested solely in fine cuisine: She's on a quest to track down the Brass Fox, another villainous pirate who turns out to be her son--and whose father is none other than Lord Ramsey. It seems that Ramsey's business concern, the Pendleton Trading Company, is deeply involved in the opium trade, hauling the illicit drug from India to China, and Captain Mabbot wants to put a stop to it. Brown is able to make his narrative both sizzling and swashbuckling.

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April 15, 2013
Brown transports readers to 1819 via the narration of Owen Wedgwood. He is the renowned chef for the wealthy owner of Pendleton Trading Company, an economic powerhouse that controls the ocean-shipping lines from east to west. When the infamous pirate Mad Hannah Mabbot commandeers their ship, Wedgwood watches her murder his employer, then steal his supper. Intoxicated by Wedgwood's skill with a skillet, Mabbot forces him to cook for his life aboard her ship where she holds him prisoner. Soon he is swept up into Mabbot's hunt for the Brass Fox, a rival rogue. At first this quest seems purely selfish, but as Wedgwood dines weekly with the captain, he begins to see the altruism that actually motivates the battle-hardened beauty. Brown concocts a clever tale in which history, ethics, action, and romance blend harmoniously. Tantalizing descriptions of the smells and flavors of the dishes Wedgwood creates may send readers running to their spice cabinets in search of the blends he exalts in, even as they are entranced by Brown's delectable tale.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2013, American Library Association.)

January 1, 2013

In 1819, the pirate Mad Hannah Mabbot kills the lord of a booming tea concern but will spare his chef as long as he serves her an extraordinary meal every Sunday. Fabri Prize winner Brown has commercial prospects; originally scheduled for June 2012.

Copyright 2013 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

March 15, 2013

Brown's second novel (after the Fabri Prize-winning The Great Days) is a coming-of-age tale even though the protagonist is middle-aged chef Owen Wedgwood. Quietly cooking for his wealthy, influential employer, Wedgwood maintains a sheltered and happy existence. His world is turned upside down, however, when he is kidnapped and forced to cook for a wild and beautiful pirate, Capt. Hannah Mabbot. Mabbot is a brutal killer with a grudge against the notorious Brass Fox, and the newly nicknamed "Wedge" reluctantly becomes a bystander to her crimes. Preoccupied with cooking gourmet meals for pirates using rat meat and moldy potatoes, Wedge learns more about the world and himself. VERDICT Brown delivers an exotic and enjoyable historical novel about a cautious man forced to live "a thousand lifetimes." Historical fiction fans and general readers will find his adventures a fascinating quick read. [See Prepub Alert, 12/5/12; also selected as a notable spring title in "Editors' Spring Picks," LJ 2/15/13--Ed.]--Jennifer Funk, McKendree Univ. Lib., Lebanon, IL

Copyright 2013 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.