St. Ives

By Robert Louis Stevenson

St. Ives is a novel by Robert Louis Stevenson. The plot concerns the adventures of the dashing Capitaine Jacques St. Ives, a Napoleonic soldier, after his capture by the British. In 1813, Capitaine Jacques St. Ives, a Hussar in the Napoleonic wars, is captured and sent to a Scottish prison camp. He's a swashbuckler, so the prison's commander, Major Farquar Bolingbroke Chevening, asks for lessons in communicating with women. Both men have their eyes on the lovely Flora, who resides with her aunt, the iconoclastic and well-traveled Miss Susan Emily Gilcrist. By chance, living close to the camp is Jacques's grandfather and brother, whom Jacques believes died years before. Jacques decides to escape, find his relatives, and win the hand of Flora; Major Chevening and an unforeseen enemy stand in his way. Can Miss Gilcrist contrive to make everything work out?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Jan 11, 2013
• ISBN: 9781300257622

Robert Louis Stevenson

Robert Louis Stevenson was born in Edinburgh in 1850, the only son of an engineer, Thomas Stevenson. Despite a lifetime of poor health, Stevenson was a keen traveller, and his first book An Inland Voyage (1878) recounted a canoe tour of France and Belgium. In 1880, he married an American divorcee, Fanny Osbourne, and there followed Stevenson's most productive period, in which he wrote, amongst other books, Treasure Island (1883), The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, and Kidnapped (both 1886). In 1888, Stevenson left Britain in search of a more salubrious climate, settling in Samoa, where he died in 1894.

Reviews for St. Ives

[chrisnewton-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I would call it a 19th century bathtub book (def: book suitable for reading in the bathtub). Writing is lovely, characterizations are disarming, storyline is farfetched. Its near-fatal drawback: RLS died before finishing it and the publisher gave it to Mr. Quiller-Couch to wrap up based on Stevenson's notes. Unfortunately, he turned a charming treat into a boring slog.

[roarer-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I enjoyed this novel, chancing upon a film version of the story shortly afterwards. The escape from Edinburgh Castle may reflect a real event in 1799, when French prisoners-of-war were assisted in their escape by the Revd William Fitzsimmons, the incumbent of the Cowgate Episcopal Chapel; the escapees in 1799 headed for a ship in the Firth of Forth.

[Suslyn · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

for this ebook version only -- the end of the bk is not there