The Barbary pirates want a ransom America cannot afford. They’re getting Jacob Fletcher instead.

1807. Sir Jacob Fletcher has a handsome house in Boston, a flourishing fur business and several excellent reasons to stay ashore. Most of those reasons are married to somebody else.

Then the American navy comes calling.

The pirates of Tazrout have captured USS John Barry and her 150 men. The treasury cannot pay for their release. So Fletcher is offered command of Declaration of Independence and a task that would give a sensible man every reason to refuse.

Unfortunately, someone has shown him the ship.
Meanwhile, Britain’s Prime Minister wants Fletcher back in his service. The Admiralty would prefer him hanged. A British captain is dispatched to find him — chosen by the Admiralty for his extraordinary talent for failure.

But on the Barbary Coast, there is precious little room for mistakes. The captured warship lies beneath a fort’s heavy guns. Her men are imprisoned somewhere inland. Even an entire battlefleet could not simply sail in and fetch them.

Bringing those men home will take every ounce of Fletcher’s cunning — and his customary disregard for the rules.