Steel by Carrie Vaughn

Steel by Carrie Vaughn

Hardcover, 304 pages

Published March 15th 2011 by HarperTeen

It was a slender length of rusted steel, tapered to a point at one end and jagged at the other, as if it had broken. A thousand people would step over it and think it trash, but not her.
This was the tip of a rapier.

Sixteen-year-old Jill has fought in dozens of fencing tournaments, but she has never held a sharpened blade. When she finds a corroded sword piece on a Caribbean beach, she is instantly intrigued and pockets it as her own personal treasure.
The broken tip holds secrets, though, and it transports Jill through time to the deck of a pirate ship. Stranded in the past and surrounded by strangers, she is forced to sign on as crew. But a pirate’s life is bloody and brief, and as Jill learns about the dark magic that brought her there, she forms a desperate scheme to get home—one that risks everything in a duel to the death with a villainous pirate captain.
Time travel, swordplay, and romance combine in an original high-seas adventure from New York Times bestseller Carrie Vaughn. – Goodreads

My Opinion: What is up with all the good books coming out? I knew that this was going to be good because Voices of Dragons was amazing but this was great! You can really learn a lot of great things about this. You can learn about pirate life, boating/sailing in the 18th century, and FENCING. Each chapter is named after a fencing move. How cool is that. There is a glossary at the end of the book that says what each chapter heading/fencing move means. And don’t let me get started on the COVER… again just like with Clarity, this cover really draws you in. Okay now to the book.

Jill was an interesting character. The book starts off adrenaline pumping and you feel her energy because she is fencing or dueling I should say for the third spot in a national competition. My favorite character had  to be Captain Cooper though. She was interesting and the whole mystery of her past was intriguing.

The plot was okay. It sort of reminded of the series Vampirates by Justin Somper, because its similar. Two children fall into water and they are transported back in time to a pirate ship and one falls in love, but that’s about where it ends. What made the book interesting were the characters and the reader thinking about what pirates would have gone through at that time. It was just interesting.

Overall: 4 out of 5