Jean Laffite

Gr 3–6—Move over, Jack Sparrow, and make way for Jean Laffite. Pirate enthusiasts will appreciate this well-researched picture-book biography of a Jewish pirate of the Caribbean, born in the early 1780s. Many Jews were kicked out of Spain and other parts of Europe at this time. Laffite's family fled to the New World and settled in Saint-Domingue, later renamed Haiti. As a boy, he longed to be a pirate like his oldest brother, who often brought him gifts from his travels. Fueled by his hatred for Spain, he eventually became a privateer, that is, a pirate with a license to capture and loot Spanish ships. Laffite seized many a Spanish schooner, became rich, fought duels, and even got marooned with his family on a desert island. In 1808, the pirates held a convention and elected him their leader. Though the Governor of Louisiana appealed to President James Madison to help eradicate pirates, the War of 1812 gave Laffite the opportunity to prove himself a hero to the American government. The impressionistic paintings were done in Photoshop with a Wacom Tablet using a palette primarily of grays and browns. The text is too lengthy for a read aloud, but young swashbucklers will enjoy reading it on their own. This well-informed narrative gives readers a sense of what was happening in the world at the time as well as what it was like to be a real pirate.—Barbara Auerbach, PS 217, Brooklyn, NY