Captain's Share: A Trader's Tale from the Golden Age of the Solar Clipper, Book 5

As always, Mr. Lowell writes a wonderful, imaginative, and brilliant novel, with a touch a pathos, a bit of adventure and a heaping of gentle humor. The complexities of the crew of the Agamemnon form the basis of this book, and their relationships with each other and Captain Ishmael Wang are a lot to read.

Glad I continued with this very enjoyable series! It is nice to see a character developed and coming forward. This is just another great book and I can’t wait to see owners share!

I only discovered Nathan Lowell's "clipper" series last year, and immediately devoured the four books that were available at the time. As I've stated in previous reviews, I enjoy the books very much but sometimes I can't quite work out why.In the first three books (which actually read like 3 parts of one big book) it seemed as though the universe was entirely inhabited by "nice people" and this starts to wear a bit thin after a while. Fortunately the fourth book introduced some real "villains" and it was a well overdue breath of fresh air. This book throws some new hurdles into our hero's path, and again the story benefits greatly from the tension this introduces. A hero cannot exist in a perfect world - there must be a dragon or two for him/her to fight - even if the dragon is just self-doubt, a wrong life decision or a toxic work situation.In the previous books Ishmael was so "perfect" that his character bordered on the unbelievable. There is no change to his character in this latest book, however (and this is significant) in the earlier books he was a teenager or young man, whereas this time he is a seasoned spacer in his late 30s and, most importantly, a captain. That makes a huge difference to the reader's perception. We know it will be a story about a moral and capable, even outstanding, individual and we accept that he will "do no wrong" as an officer, whereas that same character in the form of an inexperienced youth is hard to swallow.Mr Lowell is a good writer - certainly on a par with many other SF writers. In a lot of ways the clipper series is reminiscent of Heinlein's juveniles crossed with C.S. Forester's "Hornblower" novels, but what is unusual is the author's steadfast refusal to give in to melodramatic action scenes. It must be tempting sometimes for him to introduce space battles and other clichés, but fortunately he has so far resisted the urge. Thank goodness!It is, however, a difficult course to steer. His plots makes sense and develop well, but due to their focus on the ordinary lives of ordinary people they can sometimes produce a feeling in the reader that nothing much is happening, but it would be unfair to damn the series on that basis - Jane Austen's novels would also seem trivial and unexciting to a reader looking for an adventure story.The biggest faults I find with the series are some aspects of Mr Lowell's style - mainly his overuse of certain phrases or words. Sometimes it seems like everyone "grins" constantly, "chuckles" at small remarks, jovially punches their shipmates in the arm, etc. (I have encountered instances where the word "grin" or grinned" appears four times on the one page). Mr Lowell writes dialogue that flows very naturally, and he has a talent for describing the scenario, but more attention to the way he describes his character's actions would lift the books to a higher level.I said at the beginning of this review that I didn't know why I liked this series, but actually I do. I enjoy very much reading about this universe that Mr Lowell has created and I can imagine it as a realistic future for humanity. It is a hopeful future in which I would like to live, and it's a relief to read science fiction that is not dystopian or pessimistic. Who wouldn't want to be Ishmael Wang?All up, recommended with 4 stars.SPOILERS FOLLOW !!! DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVE NOT READ THE BOOK YET !!!----------------------------------------------------------------------Some criticisms:I thought that the undisciplined crew members "reformed" too quickly and easily after just a few dressings-down from the new captain. It was all a fraction too smooth and weakened the plot. I would have liked the tension on the ship from lack of discipline and its resolution by the new captain to develop more slowly, and to have been the focus of the novel. Ishmael is an interesting character, and more time taken over his handling of difficult situations would have been welcome and cemented his standing as a capable captain in the reader's mind.I also thought the narrative was constructed oddly for no apparent reason. The climax of the novel should have been the rescue of the stranded yacht and the failure to make delivery on time. That scene, and the preceeding scene involving the risky plan to shave a couple of days off the trip to port, were two of the best parts of the book. Continuing the book for a long time after those incidents made the last section very anti-climactic. Full payment of the ship's forfeited fee by the owner of the yacht was also a bit too good to be true - some sort of lesser payoff would have been more believable and satisfying.The introduction of yet another crew member with a troubled background in the last few chapters was a peculiar decision. Together with the fact that the book finishes quite abruptly it created the impression that this is a complete novel plus the first 20% of the next novel. If the intention was to create a cliff-hanger that would whet the reader's appetite for the next book then it did not work. I just felt puzzled at the choice of such an odd place to conclude the nattative.Just my 2c

I liked the inclusion of personal growth with the main character and how it was woven into the story line. He also dealt smoothly with personnel changes.

Nathan Lowell makes a very interesting narrative adjustment in his series, The Golden Age of the Solar Clipper.First, as all of us know consciously or unconsciously, most books have a story arc that sets a problem the protagonists must solve. The problem and its ramifications often occupy most of the narrative, and in the case of some trilogies, the problem extends for nearly a thousand pages before it's finally resolved.Second, the balance between the problem and the resolution -- in a sense, between the negative (the bad things that must be taken care of) and the positive (taking care of them and enjoying the rewards of so doing) -- is a crucial part of the structure of any story. Often, it seems, authors enjoy the problem and ancillary suffering of the protagonist (and reader) so much that they go on forever with the negative and only offer a few pages of the positive.Lowell, however, flips that script. He sets up the problem -- in this case, a difficult crew in Ishmael Wang's first time as a captain of a space trader -- in a few pages, and then gets right to the fun part of improving the situation. So in this 408-page novel, there are about 100 pages of difficulties, and then 300 pages of an upward curve.In short, the book spends much, much more time on the progress of solving the problem than on defining the problem itself, and thus it's a much more pleasant read, at least to me. (Those who prefer pain, suffering and limited hope would disagree, I'm sure.)So for those who would enjoy this kind of narrative structure, "Captain's Share" is a winner, but really, you have to start with book one, "Quarter Share," to really get the full effect. Then again, that means you have five more books left to enjoy, as the series concludes with "Owner's Share," which I look forward to reading next.

8/10 More adventures in the life and business of an Interstellar freighter. This time he's the captain with more duties to fill and knots to untie. The characters and relationships are very well written with many poignant and quite humorous situations. Some of the twists I saw coming but the foreshadowing was done with a very deft touch. There are still many things that won't bear much scrutiny in this technologically advanced future universe but the story is entertaining and certainly engrossing from beginning to end.

Not to the series, just to this book. Calling it Captain's Share makes it quite obvious that Ishmael gets his own ship to command, and it's clear that the owner sees him as a problem-solver. So his first command is rife with problems, that he eventually managed to solve. We hear nothing more of the rescue operation from the previous book, instead he misses a vital delivery date for his cargo by going to the rescue of an overcrowded ship in the very best tradition of sailors - whether on the sea or in space. But his marriage is over thanks to his cheating wife, and the woman he's drawn to isn't interested even if his conscience would let him take advantage of a subordinate. At this point I was thinking 'poor Ishmael', but the owners of the cargo he was late delivering insist on paying the full carriage amount without 'late penalty', and things are looking up for him at the end of the book.

Continues the story, dealing with trials and tribulations, hinting at things to come…we follow our hero along his normal routines, his ups and downs, his dealings with crew, wife, boss…and possible villains…the text is straight-forward, chronological, basic…entertaining and comforting…we know ishmael will carry the day, don’t we? We can relax and enjoy the ride…

Most emphatically five stars.PLEASE READ THE BOOKS IN THE CORRECT ORDER SO YOU UNDERSTAND WHAT MAKES ISHMAEL TICK.It really makes a change to read a book that is not all about people being nasty to each other. By the time I reached this book I was thoroughly caught up in Ishmael's life and I simply had to find out what happened next. I managed to lose a lot of sleep whilst reading these books because I could not put them down and I was sitting up in bed until the small hours, glued to my Kindle.Without wishing to spoil the ending of the final book, I was left quite bereft when I finished it. I wanted to know what happened next to Ishmael - and to some of the characters he had met along the way. I hope to discover a seventh book has been added soon.

This series of books are well thought out and have excellent characters and character development.

I like this series, the characters are interesting, this book intriduces a lot of new ones, The way the main character finds his way through his problems sounds reasonable to me, will be reading more of these.