Mark Clairmont | MuskokaTODAY.com

BRACEBRIDGE — The closest Cheryl Cooper has come to perils at sea is white caps on Lake Muskoka and a stabilizing Atlantic cruise ship.

But, Arrh! Make no mistake — the swashbuckling Bracebridge author is a “pirate at heart.”

“Absolutely,” she said Sunday at the launch of Beyond the Pale Horizon — her fourth book in her Seasons of War Series.

Call her a salty dog for the years she’s been at sea with her books writing and vicariously bobbing up and down living life through her “mysterious” main character Emily, a fictional 19-year-old for whom 1813 has been bloody hell — her own annus horribilis.

And the year’s not yet over for Emily Louisa, who is hardly a waif but proves a cunning survivor of a nautical world in no-woman’s land.

What began in Cooper’s book one Come Looking for Me as a young woman seemingly abandoned at sea, alone after jumping ship literally when captured by pirates while crossing the ocean five months before now destined for Canada, has emerged as her longest — and lengthiest time written — novel yet. Seven years for this book No. 4 as of its April landing. And a lifetime in its creation and crafting.

And one that had a long lineup of eager readers at the Yule Lodge at Santa’s Village anxious to see what happened to the British adventuress with blue blood in her veins and red blood on her skirt.

Her four books — including Second Summer War and Run Red With Blood — span from  June to November 1813. About six weeks per book, Cooper told MuskokaTODAY.com while signing boxes of books from the full series.

Disasters at sea

It’s all part of her own adventuresome journal journey she set sail on just over two decades ago — more than a lifetime in terms of Emily in the books.

At the inaugural Muskoka Novel Marathon in 2002, at a tiny table, Cooper embarked banging out a 75-page draft.

“I started the series after watching Russell Crowe in Master and Commander. I was absolutely besotted. Just all the things the poor men had to endure at sea. I was so captivated by the life and horrendous conditions they endured on those old war ships that I started writing about life at sea.

“And I wanted to write about Canada. In 1812 the British Empire and the Americans were at war.”

Then at home with a lap-top and a two-foot, three-masted war ship looming over her old wooden writing desk for further inspiration and pressure, she embarked on her own epic seafaring and life-altering affair with blood thirsty pirates who take more gold than they do lives.

And researching: “70 per cent of my time is researching and 30 per cent writing.”

“It’s accurate historically. The battles are real and how they rammed ships and used canons.”

When the series began Britain ruled the waves — “Rule Britannia.”

“They were so wrapped up with fighting France,” she said they took the war with the U.S. for granted. “They thought the new war with the United States was a joke. They didn’t take it seriously until they started losing at sea against new American frigates. They were ships that manoeuvred beautifully. And Britain (the Royal Navy) was humiliated by this. They were still reeling, having not gotten over the humiliation of losing the colonies in the American Revolution. Then in August 1813 they started to take the war more seriously with more men, ships and supplies.”

Thus began for the Brits a new historic order and decades more chapters for Cooper.

Emily’s first ship encounter began when she was captured at sea by the ruthless blood-thirsty pirate Capt. Thomas Trelevyn. And then abandoning him overboard sans PFD before being rescued by a slightly more amenable British naval officer.

“She says very little about herself, leaving the men quite intrigued.”

All of the action takes place “for the most part at sea,” save for a few ports of call including at Halifax and Boston. There’s many ships, mutinies, drownings, disasters — and a hint of sodomy in Come Looking for Me.

Genetic echoing

While Cooper “absolutely” believes in reincarnation, “I believe in what’s called genetic echo. That there is — not necessarily — a past life, but because of my genetic makeup with so many of my forbearers coming from Ireland, Scotland and Wales. I’m sure I sense part of that.

“So I’d love to be on the sea.

“Now, when I’m at sea I’m on a cruise ship. When there’s a bad storm it doesn’t do much. We’ve been out in Lake Muskoka when the waves have been so high it’s hard to navigate.

“I’d be a disaster on an old war ship.”

Cooper says she’s nowhere near fatigued by the fascinating and riveting trials and tribulations of seafaring wars and the allure misery, suffering and romance rain into sailors’ lives.

“The characters talk to me all the time.

“So I have at least one more sea adventure in me if not two more. I could probably continue on forever as long as I live. If I lived 150 more years I could still go with it.”

Her dad’s story

However, some day she’d also “love to write about” her dad Bruce Evans of Fowler Construction fame. “And how he grew up in Beatrice west of Bracebridge.

He “lived in a shack near Camel Lake during the Depression and I’d love to tell the stories and experiences that came out of that.

“I really, really want to write that.”

In the meantime, she continues to read “particularly historical fiction books.

“Not audio books. My eyesight is hanging in.”

And to journal.

“I’ve journalled since age 12 and I have over 6,000 pages in 45 books.”

For an author who humbly describes herself as an “average writer,” she’s much more than that in crafting four deeply-researched, beautifully and stunningly written and riveting books that capture a centuries old forgotten way of life that resonates with landlubber readers in an authentic story they can viscerally feel. Like a cat of nine tails that make you clamour for characters to avoid walking the plank.

Cooper said she doesn’t do readings at her book signing, preferring to leave it up to readers to enjoy it on their own.

“I just think people just prefer to be here and mingle.”

And buy books.

Check Cedar Canoe Books and the Owl Pen bookstores in Bracebridge and Huntsville for all her books.

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