Running Close to the Wind (4, 2024) | Alexandra Rowland

Our Flag Means Death meets Six of Crows in this queer pirate adventure from the author of A Taste of Gold and Iron. 'Come for the irrepressible gremlin of a narrator, stay for the plot-relevant cake competitions! A whip-smart, hilarious and exuberant high seas romp' – Freya Marske, Sunday Times bestselling author of A Marvellous Light Avra Helvaçi, former field agent of the Arashti Ministry of Intelligence, has accidentally stolen the single most expensive secret in the world – and the only place to flee with a secret that big is the open sea. To find a buyer with deep enough pockets, Avra must work with his on-again, off-again ex, the pirate Captain Teveri az-Haffar. Together, they will have to risk journeying to the isolated pirate republic of the Isles of Lost Souls. The only things in their way? A calculating new Arashti ambassador to the Isles; Brother Julian, a beautiful, mysterious new member of the crew with secrets of his own; and the fact that they’re sailing straight into sea serpent breeding season and almost certain doom. But if they can find a way to survive and sell the secret on the black market, they’ll all be as wealthy as kings – and, more importantly, they’ll be legends . . . 'Uproariously funny, exquisitely witty, brimming with buckling of swashes and scuttling of butts' – Premee Mohamed, Nebula Award-winning author of Beneath the Rising