Steel by Carrie Vaughn Review

"It was a slender length of rusted steel, tapered to a point at one end and jagged at the other, as if it had broken. A thousand people would step over it and think it trash, but not her.

This was the tip of a rapier.

Sixteen-year-old Jill has fought in dozens of fencing tournaments, but she has never held a sharpened blade. When she finds a corroded sword piece on a Caribbean beach, she is instantly intrigued and pockets it as her own personal treasure.

The broken tip holds secrets, though, and it transports Jill through time to the deck of a pirate ship. Stranded in the past and surrounded by strangers, she is forced to sign on as crew. But a pirate's life is bloody and brief, and as Jill learns about the dark magic that brought her there, she forms a desperate scheme to get home—one that risks everything in a duel to the death with a villainous pirate captain.

Time travel, swordplay, and romance combine in an original high-seas adventure from New York Times bestseller Carrie Vaughn."

Steel is a time traveling book, with tons of pirates like Mary Read and Blackbeard. Simply imagine this book to be the Pirates of the Caribbean without Johnny Depp and his infamous eyeliner. Then add in some female captains along with a few murderous people and a modern teenage girl. Don't forget the 'ahoy.'

Do you see it yet? Maybe not.

Steel is pretty much the oddest book I'd ever read. I don't even know why I bother to read it. It's not horrible. It's just dry and flakey. The plot isn't very tasty. Everything feels dry and boring, even in the face of danger. 

Let's break it down. Steel's plot is so forgettable that even after an hour I nearly forgotten everything about this book. Truth be told, I can't remember much about this book even though I'm the queen of memory. It's very sad. Usually I can remember a plot and the summary of this book for around a week and up to forever. But this book? No, I can't remember a single thing, other than pirates and the lack of Johnny Depp. 

That's a lie. I still remember some details. 

There's no romance. The subtitle of Steel said something like pirates and romance and some other thing. Well, there's barely romance. I wouldn't even call it romance unless a one-way admiration between a rapier and a girl counts as romance. True story. 

Jill is pretty much a lost girl trying to find her way home for most of the book. It annoys me somewhat, because she keeps on whining and whining until she's put to work. Sometimes I wish she wouldn't complain so much. Maybe a little duct tape...

The swordplay between Jill and other characters was questionable. I'm not sure how she can fight a pirate and survive even though she spends most of the time scrubbing decks instead of practicing. Hmm...maybe time traveling has its perks?

Rating: One out of Five