James L. Nelson

James L. Nelson was born and raised in Lewiston, Maine and graduated from UCLA with a degree in motion picture/television production. Finding that despite being in Southern California, it was a damp, drizzly November in his soul, Jim took the cure Melville recommended and decided to sail about a little and see the watery part of the world. For six years he worked on board traditional sailing ships before he turned thirty and realised it would be easier to write about sailing rather than actually doing it. His career as a writer began in 1994 and he has since written works of maritime fiction and history. He is the winner or the American Library Association/William Young Boyd Award and the Naval Order's Samuel Eliot Morison Award. Nelson has lectured all over the country and appeared on the Discovery Channel, History Channel and BookTV. He currently lives in Harpswell, Maine, with his former shipmate, now wife Lisa and their four children.

He has written three historic naval fiction series, the Revolution at Sea Saga, the Brethren of the Coast trilogy and the Samuel Bowater series, as well as other nautical fiction and non-fiction books about early American naval activities.

Age of Sail: Fiction

AOS Naval Fiction

Series: Revolution at Sea Saga (Isaac Biddlecomb)
By Force of Arms : 1775: Biddlecomb is captured by a mad English captain
The Maddest Idea : 1775: Biddlecomb is sent in search of gunpowder
The Continental Risque : 1776: In command of the brig-of-war Charlemagne Biddlecomb heads for Bermuda
Lords of the Ocean : 1776: Biddlecomb must transport Dr Benjamin Franklin to France
All the Brave Fellows : 1777: Biddlecomb must rescue the new frigate Falmouth
The Falmouth Frigate : 1777: Biddlecomb is trapped in a desolate harbor
The French Prize : Isaac's son finds himself taking command of the merchant vessel Abigail bound for Barbados
 
Series: The Brethren of the Coast trilogy (Thomas Marlowe)
The Guardship : 1701: Marlowe an ex-pirate is given command of the Virginia colony's guardship
The Blackbirder : 1702::Marlowe must go after an old friend who slaughtered a slave ship's crew.
The Pirate Round : 1706: Marlowe heads for the Indian Ocean
 
Series: Samuel Bowater
Glory in the Name : 1861: Lt. Samuel Bowater USN, a native of Charleston SC, accepts a commission in the nascent Confederate Navy
Thieves of Mercy : 1862: Having survived the bloody Battle of New Orleans Bowater has orders to take command of an ironclad warship being built in Memphis

AOS Pirate Fiction

Series: Blood, Steel, and Empire
The Buccaneer Coast : When a deadly hurricane sweeps through the Caribbean, it up-ends the buccaneers’ rough existence
The Tortuga Plantation : A powerful fleet sent from Seville comes to route the buccaneers
 
Series: n/a
The Only Life That Mattered : The Short and Merry Lives of Anne Bonny, Mary Read, and Calico Jack Rackam

The author’s official web site is jameslnelson.com

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