The story takes place two years before the King of Spain launches his "invincible Armada" against England.  Word of huge numbers of ships gathering in Cadiz has brought some enterprising privateers south to try to disrupt Spanish shipping until Elizabeth can build a navy to protect her shores.  Jonas Spence and his daughter Isabeau are on a merchant ship bound for the Indies when they come across a ship dead and drifting in the water.  When they board it they find the crew very much alive, captained by Simon Dante, who proceeds to take over Spence's ship and hunt down the traitor who attacked his ship and left his crew for dead.
I had an absolute blast writing this book.  I had gotten my feet wet, so to speak, with The Wind and the Sea and figured I had a handle on feisty, sharp-tongued heroines who weren't about to take any crap from men who considered them weak and only good for one thing.  I would have loved to have been Beau Spence.  I would have loved to have met Sir Francis Drake and sailed alongside the legendary seahawks.  The burning of Cadiz was a major coup for the English privateers and it set the Spanish invasion attempt back two years, not because all that many ships were burned in port, but because most of the seasoned oak that went into making water barrels was stored in Cadiz, and without water barrels, the fleet could not sail. 

Those are the kinds of little details I love to come across when I'm searching for ideas for writing the next book. 

Water barrels and a certain ring inspired Across A Moonlit Sea.  The ring never made it into the story...not this story  anyway...but only because I thought it deserved a book and characters of its own. *s*
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