It’s a pirate novel, but a pirate novel by Tim Powers, which means we get magic and weird stuff generally as well as Blackbeard - who here is called Edward Thatch, not ‘Teach’ as he is usually named. It’s all bound up with Juan Ponce de Leon and the search for the Fountain of Youth in the swamps of what was to become Louisiana. This novel probably made Powers' name, at least once his influence on "Pirates of the Caribbean" was acknowledged.