Rears & Vices (publication day March 17, 2026), by E.M. Caro intrigued me immediately–a pirate story beginning on Lake Ontario in Canada? Set in 1816, Everard Anderson de Anglada is the captain of a British 10-gun schooner stationed in the Great Lakes Service, just after the War of 1812 has ended. His friend and former lover Preston D’Arcy, also captain in the British Navy, meets him so they can both attend a court martial Ever has been in service for over 20 years, snatched from the docks of Barcelona, working his way up and taking advantage of his father’s British name, and has for the last three years been given the name “Blackhand” because of the glove he wears to cover damage received 3 years prior, leaving him with just a couple of fingers on his left hand.
When the mask and gag is removed from the prisoner–who is accused of piracy and sodomy–crimes against the Crown with the punishment of hanging, Everard recognizes him as Vitaly/Vitya Gray–who he met years ago and had a brief dalliance with. He impulsively recuses himself and also offers evidence that Vitaly couldn’t have committed the crimes of which he is accused because he was under Everard’s command at the time. Everard has to forge the evidence that evening, but he’s sure he’ll save Vitaly from the noose. That evening, D’Arcy gives Everard more shocking news–that he is to be stripped of his command, pension, everything, and charged with conspiracy against the Crown. So the two, along with Ever’s ship’s boy Thom, leave the ship with Ever’s few belongings, and go back to break Vitya free and escape themselves.
Caro does a great job of giving the reader just enough information, a little at a time, so that you want to keep reading and finding out more about these characters. It’s a bit of an angsty story, but I really enjoyed it. Turns out Vitya is actually Varfolomey–the most wanted pirate in all of the Atlantic, and he offers Everard matelotage–essentially to become his heir, his partner in life and business, as a way of keeping the world from thinking that Varfolomey has bribed the British in order to avoid hanging. And Everard agrees, so he and D’Arcy and Thom make their way to Boston with Vitya, and then to his flagship, the Sévère, in Matagorda Bay in what is now Texas.
There, Everard has to figure out his own role since he’s no longer a captain, and what is his relationship with D’Arcy? Being Vitya’s matelot does not mean that he can’t continue to have relations with D’Arcy. And there are so many plots and new republics–with Nueva Spain, and Haiti–it’s hard to know who to trust.
The spicy scenes are <chef’s kiss!> and it’s a great escapist adventure. I loved that Caro had the brawny Vitya–captain of a flotilla of pirate ships–knit his own socks in his spare time in the cabin! And choosing for Everard to have a disability–still dealing with the loss of much of his hand–was a great choice for representation as well. I consider it weight-neutral, as there aren’t any negative descriptions of fatness or preference for a thin body.
Reading While Fat 