Pirates on land

Even on land, Spider John can't escape the pirate life. In A Bottle of Rum, the third installment in Steve Goble's Spider John mystery series, our hero keeps telling himself and Odin, his aging comrade, that they are ex-pirates. That life is behind them. Spider just wants to return to his wife, Em, and their son, whom he hasn't seen in years. But then there's a murder in an inn where they are drinking, and if there's one thing more of a lure for Spider than Em it is a mystery. He discovers that the murder weapon is a knife that he made himself and had given to Hob, a young pirate who in previous novels has become something of a stand-in for his son.

Spider John quickly determines Hob is not the killer. For him the larger mystery is to find his young friend, and if necessary rescue him. The search leads him and Odin to join a gang of cutthroats hired to protect a compound where an odd doctor named Oates is supposedly treating mentally ill patients while, at the same time, conducting strange experiments on them. Might Hob be one of those "patients"? And why would a hospital need so many armed guards?

Goble gives us plenty of pirate-style action, even if on dry land, as Spider and Odin draw closer to the truth about Oates and, eventually, about Hob. Spider John may think of himself as an ex-pirate, but he must think like a pirate and fight like one to get out of this mess and one step closer to Em.