BOOK LAUNCH - THE PENGUIN BOOK OF PIRATES - at Colony House

Charter Books and the Newport Historical Society present New York Times bestselling author Katherine Howe, editor of The Penguin Book of Pirates in conversation with Daphne Geanacopoulos, author of The Pirate's Wife, in this special book launch event.

Colonial Newport thrived during the Golden Age of Piracy, and it nurtured a vibrant economy based on smuggling and extralegal mercantile ventures. Now, with the milestone release of this Penguin Classics compilation of real-life accounts of the world's most notorious pirates, Newport's piratical history is in the spotlight once again. Get your tickets now!

Interview and discussion followed by Q&A and book signing. The Penguin Book of Pirates as well as both authors' works are available for pre-order below and for sale at the event.

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Real-life accounts of the world’s most notorious pirates—both men and women, from the Golden Age of Piracy and beyond—compiled by the New York Times bestselling author of A True Account: Hannah Masury’s Sojourn Amongst the Pyrates, Written by Herself

A Penguin Classic

Spanning three centuries and eight thousand nautical miles, and compiled by a direct descendant of a sailor who waged war with pirates in the early nineteenth century, The Penguin Book of Pirates takes us behind the eye patches, the peg legs, and the skull and crossbones of the Jolly Roger and into the no-man’s-land of piracy that is rife with paradoxes and plot twists. Here, in a fascinating array of accounts that include trial transcripts, journalism, ship logs, and more, are the grit and patois of real maritime marauders like the infamous Blackbeard; the pirates who inspired Jack Sparrow in Pirates of the Caribbean, Stede Bonnet in Max’s Our Flag Means Death, and the Dread Pirate Roberts in The Princess Bride; the astoundingly egalitarian multi-ethnic and multilingual crews that became enmeshed in historical horrors like the slave trade; and lesser-known but no less formidable women pirates, many of whom disguised themselves as men. By turns brutal, harrowing, and inspiring, these accounts of the “radically free” sailors who were citizens more of the oceangoing world than of any nation on land remind us of the glories and dangers of the open seas and the seductive appeal of communities forged in resistance.

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Katherine Howe is a bestselling and award-winning historian and novelist who is a direct descendant of a nineteenth-century sailor who battled pirates on the high seas as well as three women who were tried for witchcraft in Salem. She is the editor of The Penguin Book of Pirates and The Penguin Book of Witches; the author of the novels A True Account: Hannah Masury’s Sojourn Amongst the Pyrates, Written by Herself and The Daughters of Temperance Hobbs, the New York Times bestselling novels The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane and The House of Velvet and Glass, and the young adult novels Conversion and The Appearance of Annie van Sinderen; and the coauthor with Anderson Cooper of the New York Times bestsellers Vanderbilt: The Rise and Fall of an American Dynasty and Astor: The Rise and Fall of an American Fortune. A native Houstonian, she lives and sails with her family in New England.

Dr. Daphne Palmer Geanacopoulos is a historian, journalist, and author of The Pirate's Wife: The Remarkable True Story of Sarah Kidd and The Pirate Next Door: The Untold Story of Eighteenth-Century Pirates’ Wives, Families and Communities. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times, the Washington Post, Southern Living, Virginia Business, and other outlets. She lives in Cape Cod, Massachusetts, with her husband, David