On Starlit Seas – The Times best historical fiction book of the year winner (Paperback)

Our summary description

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Maria Graham has already survived loss, shipwreck, and the strictures of Georgian respectability. Now, determined to shape her own future, she must cross the Atlantic from Brazil to London to deliver her latest book and secure her independence. It is not a safe moment to travel. Civil war simmers along the coast, and few captains will take a woman alone.

Her only passage is aboard a vessel captained by James Henderson, a smuggler whose charm sits easily alongside danger. At sea, routine and trust develop slowly, shaped by long days and shared risk. But the voyage unsettles Maria’s hard won certainty. She uncovers a secret that threatens everyone on board, and finds herself drawn toward a man who represents everything she has learned to be wary of.

On Starlit Seas is a historical novel alive with movement and moral tension. It explores freedom claimed late, desire weighed against experience, and the fragile space between independence and connection, where the horizon promises change but offers no guarantees.