Burke in the land of Silver by Tom Williams is a neat first book in a series about soldier and spy James Burke. It is also the story of the founding of Argentina. I found this book entertaining and will sometime in the future try more books in this series. It is the first book set in the era of Napolenonic wars that almost have nothing to do with Napoleon himself. I found it great reading about so many different unusal sides of this time in history and I have always had a soft spot for the land in south america. I am thankful that BokksGoSocial and Netgalley still had a copy available.

A novel based on the international adventures of a real British spy, James Burke, during the period of the Napoleonic War.

The book is chock full of intrigue, travel, violence, and seduction of women. Very reminiscent of the books about the other well-known fictitious British spy, who strangely has the same initials.
The author has clearly undertaken his homework on actual events, people, and places. I loved the in-depth details about South America, especially Buenos Aires & Rio de Janeiro, during the colonial era. Tom Williams seems to love BA and the people as much as I do. His descriptions of the risks in crossing through Andean passes on foot at certain times of the year are spot on.

Stupidly, I hadn’t before connected the names of Argentina or Rio Plata with silver. Also that the state of Bolivia never existed during the period of Spanish colonisation, the area was treated by the colonisers as a very productive silver mine. It is always enjoyable to learn new facts while reading a novel.

South America is very rarely mentioned by historians when discussing the war against Napoleon in Europe.
I cant wait to read other books by the same author!

I like this kind of book and this one was a decent example of this kind of historical fiction set in Napoleonic times. My big complaint was that the editing or transposing this book to digital/Kindle was horrible. Lots of unfinished sentences and lack of continuity to sentences. Hard to enjoy a book under these circumstances. I will try another of Williams’ historical fiction-hopefully without the issues in this book.