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Mar 15, 2016ryner rated this title 4 out of 5 stars
When a decrepit, eccentric sea captain and his sea chest arrive to stay at an inn run by Jim Hawkins' mother, the young lad finds himself thrust into an old conflict among sailors. The captain is visited numerous times by threatening characters from his seagoing days, eventually culminating in his death and in Jim's and his mother's escape from the inn to safety with the sea chest. In a nearby town Jim presents the squire with a treasure map from the chest, and the squire, with romantic ideas of gentlemanly adventure, immediately procures and ship and a seasoned crew. Before he knows it, Jim is assigned to be the cabin boy on what would ultimately be perhaps one of the most famous adventure voyages in literature. I hadn't read Treasure Island in my youth, and ended up picking it up on a whim one day at the age of 40. I'm a huge fan of adventure tales, and Treasure Island didn't disappoint, although my 21st-century sensibilities were amazed at the amount of violence and murder accompanying a children's book. Youth, and society in general, were undoubtedly more inured to violence in a way that we are sheltered from for the most part today. The bloodshed didn't necessarily decrease my enjoyment of the book, and in fact probably increased it by way of its relative rebelliousness. Still, I couldn't picture my elementary-school-aged child reading it without offering additional guidance and discussion.