Point of View

The point of view is from the standpoint of an omniscient narrator, a somewhat sloppy one in some respects. The narrator does not handle transitions well and, often, from a stylistic sense, there really is no transition from one scene to the next. One moment you are in a tavern, the next moment you are at sea. It's almost as if the text is written in notes. Also, the narrator very freely uses the technical sea jargon of the period, with little or no explanation, leaving it to the reader to figure it out for himself. Various other terms- describing medical instruments or drugs, items of cuisines, names of places or current political or naval figures are often mentioned but not explained.

This gives the reader the concept that, who ever is narrating this is very much locked into the time of the historical narrative and...