Lydia Bailey

I loved the portrayal of Toussaint L’ouverture. He was a man of character and action. It amazed me that during wartime a ship captain could takeover another vessel and make it his own. A great way to build a fleet!

I never thought about the contrarian viewpoints of early American history, and how mainstream these ideas seemed back when the issues were still being thrashed out. Roberts opened my eyes to the history that disappeared after one way of life triumphed over another. His other books are good too, especially "OLIVER WISWELL". Who knew that Benedict Arnold was a patriot, and could be seen as a betrayed leader rather than a traitor? I'm going to get out my Kenneth Roberts collection and start over again through the best fiction out there on the Revolutionary War!!

This Roberts novel is in the true picaresque tradition with action beginning in New England, moving on to Revolutionary Haiti, and ultimately to the very Shores of Tripoli. Albion Hamlin is captivated by a portrait and the adventure is on. Roberts' formula, employed so strikingly in Arundel and its sequels, is evident here again: a young American man, a bit of an innocent despite his education, falls victim to an evil woman (Harriet Faulkner, the Mary Malinson/Marie de Sabrevois figure of this book), is thrown into a swirl of epically dramatic but mostly very accurate historical events, picks up a larger than life comic-relief sidekick (King Dick, the Cap Huff figure here), encounters many adventures and grave hardships, and wins his true love in the end (Lydia; a far more demure Phoebe; much more reminiscent Ellen the 'female lead' of his novel Rabble In Arms). [Note: also like Cap Huff, King Dick serves the role of sidekick more than once in Roberts' fiction. He makes a subsequent appearance in The Lively Lady, Roberts' novel of the War of 1812.] Almost all of Roberts' books are dramatic page-turners, and this one is too, in most places--especially in the upheavals of the Haitian Revolution. But later in the book, as Albion is the captive of Barbary Pirates, the story--to me--actually bogs a little; at least until his rescue and the ensuing adventures. Among the Roberts books, this is among my least favorites (I emphatically cannot sympathize with the Tory Oliver Wiswell, but I think that's just prejudice), but yet I like it very much. High praise for Roberts the story-teller. Some complain Roberts' wriring is overwrought and his histories nothing but hopeless romances. Be this as it may, he was a master of crafting extremely exciting fictional but historically quite accurate accounts of important historic events of early American history. If you only read one Roberts book, go read Arundel, his first and I believe best novel; or Northwest Passage, a true epic. But if you get hooked on either of those, please treat yourself to reading the rest of the Roberts oeuvre, Lydia Bailey emphatically included.

Lydia Bailey was excellent - like all of Roberts' books, but I found the end to be a bit of a let down. Throughout the book, I found the lack of American-ness disapointing. Most of the 500 page novel takes place in Haiti and Algiers, only the first 75 pages or so necessary for preparation of the plot take place in America. Robert's writing is starkly realistic, exciting, and concisely descriptive - In his stories, I feel like I myself am in the Maine wilderness, the Haiti jungle, or the African desert. Lydia Bailey is a real page-turner, chock-full of adventure, action, and some romance. Although it's not the best of Kenneth Roberts, it's definitely worth the read.

Wow! This book covers more ground in a mere 500 pages than I could ever have imagined before reading it. The adventures of Albion Hamlin are postively Odyssean. Our protagonist is at various times a farmer, a lawyer, a prisoner, a soldier, and a slave. And the action takes us from New England to Haiti, France, and North Africa. Somehow, in the end, it all makes complete sense. The successful integration of so many stories and characters is remarkable.Albion's companion, King Dick, is especially interesting, a more heroic though still light-hearted incarnation of the Cap Huff character from the Arundel series, always to the rescue. And the historical characters, dozens of them, are captivating (sometimes quite literally). Unlike the Odyssey, there are no fantastic multi-headed homicidal creatures to fend off, but some of the humans are reasonable substitutes.If I had to cite a shortcoming, it would be that here and there Roberts strains plausibility almost to the breaking point, most notably in the rapidity with which Lydia Bailey and Albion Hamlin fall in love. Ironically, it is the title character, Lydia, who is perhaps the most superficial of all the personalities who make appearances in this novel. But this is a minor flaw that is more than compensated for by extraordinary character development elsewhere.In the final analysis, this is a great, grand book that has a lot to say about human nature, about war, about politics, and about humanity. It gets better with every page and has the power to capture the reader and whisk him away, never to return.Lydia Bailey earns my highest recommendation for those lucky readers who can occasionally suspend disbelief. Others will find it enjoyable, too.

It's been more than thirty years since I first read "Lydia Bailey" and I'm glad to see it available again after years out of print. Kenneth Roberts was a terrific writer and he has a terrific story to tell, with action ranging from New England in the early 1800's, to Haiti during Toussaint L'Ouverture's rebellion, to the Barbary Coast. This novel is a little bit detective story, a whole lot of rousing adventure and just the right amount of romance, mixed in with plenty of pointed observations along the way about political shenanigans and the highs and lows of human nature. They really don't write 'em this way any more--which is a shame. Very highly recommended!