Rating: 
Summary: Gripping
Review: Zack's well-researched account of the famous fall of William Kidd, and the parallel course of actual pirate Robert Culliford, makes for excellent reading and will change the way you think about Kidd. For most readers, William Kidd was a notorious, blood-thirsty pirate who allegedly buried large stashes of treasure. In fact, after examining many original sources, Zacks reveals that Kidd was actually a gentleman and well-financed mercenary, a man outfitted by leading merchants of the late 17th century to seek out and steal from pirates themselves. It is touching to read about Kidd's confidence that his backers would support him, and his belief that the truth would come out if he was ever tried as a pirate.By contrast, Culliford is a despicable rogue, leading Kidd's crew to mutiny on more than one occassion, and whose luck never seemed to run out even as he was captured and jailed as a pirate in London. Zacks sometimes alternates chapters between Kidd and Culliford, detailing the public hysteria over Captain Kidd, despite his honorable deeds and charter to hunt down pirates, while the rogue Culliford gets away with much more. Ultimately the biggest villain of the book has to be the legal authorities in London, who railroad Kidd and conveniently lose the most important documents for his defense, consisting of French passes which made Kidd's capture of two Moorish vessels legal spoils of war. Kidd wastes away in solitary confinement with no formal charges against him for months, in despicable conditions at Newgate prison. Overall, I thought this book did a very admirable job of portraying pirate life in great detail. We learn what they wore, how they traded for goods with shady merchants in places like Madagascar, and how discipline was meted out. I for one was also suprised by the "democratic" way in which decisions were made on pirate ships - captains did not hold as much authority as commonly believed. I was likewise surprised to learn how supposedly greedy buccaneers would seek out the widows of slain comrades to deliver their "shares" of the plunder. All in all, I was very impressed with The Pirate Hunter, and after skimming Zacks' sources (including the original commissions and letters reprinted in the pages of this book), it is tough to challenge any of his conclusions. A first-rate read.
Rating: 
Summary: A little long
Review: Although good editing would have made this less cumbersome, overall a well told story.
Rating:
Summary: MESMERIZING
Review: COULD NOT PUT IT DOWN. EASY READ AND VERY INFORMATIVE. HIGHLY RECOMMEND TO ANYONE WITH AN INTEREST IN A FACTUAL INTERPERTATION OF THE HISTORY OF CAPTAIN KIDD. THANK YOU MISTER ZACKS FOR A VERY ENJOYABLE BOOK.
Rating:
Summary: Gripping and enjoyable read but if details were calories....
Review: ...this book would make you VERY fat! The Pirate Hunter chronicles the history of Captain William Kidd, a "privateer" from New York who received a questionable commission from England to police the high seas for pirates. Zacks documents in glorious detail Kidd's 2-year voyage resulting in the capture of 2 ships that were--in theory--French and thus subject to capture as spoils of war. Authorities later claimed Kidd was a REAL pirate rather than a pirate-hunter. Zacks builds a convincing case that Kidd was justified by 17-century standards in taking the ships and thus was undeserving of his sad fate. Although I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book, Zack's instinct for the entertaining detail could have been balanced against the length of the book, which is about 400 pages. 350 would have been enough for me, especially when Zacks digresses to tell the story of rival pirate Robert Culliford temporarily dropping the Kidd narrative. Also, to my warped 21st-century mind, the distinction between a privateer (essentially a pirate with a government license to take goods from merchants luckless enough to be flying under an enemy flag) and a private is a pretty small one. To accept Kidd as innocent of piracy you would have to believe him incredibly naive. Nevertheless, I think your interest in William Kidd will outlast this book- it's a fascinating part of history and Zacks has a good time with it.
Rating:
Summary: HBO meets the History Channel
Review: It would be unfair to refer to Richard Zacks as a historian, as it would suggest a dry, stale read. "Pirate Hunter" has neither of these characteristics, as it is as vivid, and vibrant a book as I have read in many years. Due to Zacks' engaging storyteling abilities, you'll be reluctant to put it down - but the history and research Zacks' uses to compile this story empowers you just as a graduate level history survey would. "Pirate Hunter" has everything you'd expect from a tale of pirates, minus Captain Kidd - who turns out to be quite an honest man. Fear not, for there are ample accounts of other sinister pirates, who make Captain Kidd's legend look like something out of a Disney movie. I have seen and read many accounts of Kidd's legend, and all seem intent on abandoning a historian's quest for truth while embracing a child's thirst for a juicy tale. Zacks conclusively presents a case for Kidd's innocence and offers copious amounts of evidence to support it. Upon reading the last page, I found myself craving more pirates, more adventure, more history, and more Richard Zacks!
Rating:
Summary: repaying the captain
Review: It is not too much to say that men like William Kidd made me a reader, and one suspects the same is true for many of my generation. In 5th
Grade an especially wise teacher exploited a glimmer of interest in explorers and pirates to get me to read just about every book I could find on the great European Age of Exploration and the attendant age of piracy. From Columbus to Ponce de Leon to LaSalle to Drake, I read them all with the promiscuity of the new enthusiast. Of course, one thing led to another and soon novels like Swiss Family Robinson and Treasure Island and Robinson Crusoe and the Hornblower books were stacked up on bookshelves like planes at a busy airport, waiting their turns to land and disgorge their contents. And then you had the movies...besides versions of the books above you had Peter Pan, Mutiny on the Bounty, Captain Blood, and, of course, Abbott and Costello Meet Captain Kidd (1952) with Charles Laughton, better remembered as Captain Bligh, reprising his role from Captain Kidd. Even Cap'n Crunch cereal fed a kids fantasies of taking to the sea in a wooden ship and finding adventure there. Thus did sailing men, even the rascals and dastards among them, like Captain Kidd, light a fire in at least one young mind. All of which makes it a particularly pleasant experience to read this entertaining and authoritative rehabilitation of Kidd by Richard Zacks. As Mr. Zacks shows in exhaustive, and perhaps a bit exhausting, detail, William Kidd was not really the scoundrel pirate of legend but a duly deputized privateer, sent out to capture pirates in exchange for a share of their loot. It was only through a series of unfortunate mishaps and the repeated intervention of a hitherto uncelebrated nemesis, Robert Culliford, that Kidd himself came to be accused of piracy and ended up dangling from the end of a rope. Mr. Zacks relates the sorrowful tale of Kidd's 1696 expedition, that set out from Manhattan aboard the Adventure Galley but ended on a London gallows in 1701. Mr. Zacks is a zealous advocate for Kidd's innocence and his passion is contagious. But Kidd makes for a doomed and tragic hero, what with a mutinous crew, an unsturdy ship, feckless backers, and the bedeviling presence time and again of his rival, Culliford. Kidd's behavior, as presented here, is genuinely admirable, particularly his determination to clear his name after he'd been wrongly accused of piracy in the taking of two ships. Kidd essentially put his own neck in the noose by sailing back to New York to face the charges. It was in New York that the legend that he'd hidden his treasure arose, and Mr. Zacks shows us why. In fact, this is just one of many myths and legends that Mr. Zacks lays to rest, but part of what makes the book so enchanting is that the truths he reveals are just as compelling as the fictions they replace. In particular, despite the enduring image of ruthless captains wielding iron discipline, it's interesting to discover just how democratic the pirate society really was. But no truth is more beguiling than the real life Captain Kidd who we're introduced to. If the book is a bit too long and too minute by minute, which I believe to be the case, it is nonetheless carried along by Kidd and by our desire, though we know it futile, to see justice done him and barring that, our almost equally strong desire to see Culliford and some of the others who wronged Kidd get their comeuppances. But few do and as for Kidd : William Kidd, born in Dundee, married in New York, hanged in London, was then hoisted in chains onto the oak gibbet at Tilbury. For years
afterward, men and women aboard all ships going to and coming from the trading metropolis of London could see him there swaying in the
breezes, the Admiralty's stark warning to anyone contemplating the merry life of piracy. The poor benighted Captain would have to wait three hundred years for Richard Zacks to come along and set the record straight, which with the help of a painstakingly assembled historical record and a key piece of evidence uncovered in 1911 in the dense thickets of the British bureaucracy he does. GRADE : A-
Rating:
Summary: Amazing Research; Well Presented
Review: Zacks has sifted through thousands of documents to distill the Truth. It is stranger than fiction! A riveting read and incredible glimpse into life during the modern but pre-industrial past.
Rating: 
Summary: Not as Good as I thought it Would Be
Review: In short, I was disappointed. I was looking for a great adventure, and found myself getting bogged down by the author's penchant for skipping around in different times. For example, you're reading about two pirates and have been reading about them for some time, when suddenly he states, "in fact, they had met some time before..." and then goes to another chapter about what occurred ten years before. He does this several times and I found it disconcerting, and in some cases, boring. This author also has a way of stating an unpleasantry in a blunt and vulgar manner, that looks like he's attempting to shock you. I didn't appreciate that. Read Batavia's Graveyard, The Ice Master, or any other "sea adventure," before choosing this one.
Rating:
Summary: A Fantastic Voyage into the Era of Privateers and Pirates
Review: Meticulously researched and masterfully told, THE PIRATE HUNTER transports the reader back in time so as to stand in the sea boots of the real Captian Kidd. Richard Zacks does a marvelous job of weaving mountains of historical information into a compeling story of a wronged and misunderstood Captian Kidd. Extremely entertaining and loaded with whimsical insights into life of that time, both onboard the vessel and off. This well told tale will please any reader and is a must read for anyone who enjoys tales of sailing ships in a bygone era.
Rating:
Summary: Put wind in my sail...
Review: ...to learn more about pirates and the pirate lie-style...I mean lifestyle. Zack's book is rich and real. You almost feel the salt water dripping from each page. It is a true keyhole into the fascinating 17th century world of the rugged life on the ocean. I never thought much about buccaneers or pirates before cracking open this yarn, but it was not only a page-turner, but an eye-opener. What I especially liked was how Zacks turned the story on its (real life) head. Instead of Kidd being a bad guy -- as history books tell us -- Kidd was actually a good guy chasing the bad guys. Can't wait to see the movie. (Hello Hollywood or A&E, TNT or The History Channel...are yuh listening?)
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