Mary Faber is a street kid in 1790s London, England. Her mom and dad, who taught her to read, died in an epidemic, leaving Mary to fend for herself. She falls in with a street gang and spends her days begging. She is frequently hungry and always dirty. Still it is better than being alone.
One day, the gang leader is killed. He was bigger and older than the other kids and without his protection, the gang can't survive. Mary sets off on her own, using the leader's old clothes, she passes herself off as a boy. Because she can read, she lands a position as a ship's boy, calling herself Jacky.
Together, she and the other ship boys form a new fraternity. Mary is thrilled with her new life. Not only does she get plenty to eat, but she is clean for the first time in many years. Her only problem is keeping her gender a secret. That is until she runs afoul of a nasty pederast who is determined to have his way with what he believes is a young boy.
Consequences of that run in divide the ship and divide Mary from her ship boy pals. Plus Mary, who is a young teen, finds her body betraying her as she fights to hide her maturing figure and deal with her monthly cycle. She begins to tire of the deception and comes to realize that it must soon end. She just hopes the captain puts her down at a nice port and doesn't just dump her overboard. Then the ship has a devastating encounter with a nest of pirates and Mary finds herself all alone on a strange and frightening shore.
This was a fun and enlightening look at life on board a British ship set in the years just before the turn of the century from the 1700s to the 1800s. Somehow, Mary manages to keep her secret, which was kind of hard to believe. Still, I enjoyed reading about her and her growing maturity and her blossoming love for one of her fellow ship boys.
Review by Kirkus Reviews.
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