{"id":6269,"date":"2025-12-02T14:10:00","date_gmt":"2025-12-02T14:10:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/2025\/12\/02\/write-of-passage-lead-like-a-pirate\/"},"modified":"2025-12-02T14:10:00","modified_gmt":"2025-12-02T14:10:00","slug":"write-of-passage-lead-like-a-pirate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/2025\/12\/02\/write-of-passage-lead-like-a-pirate\/","title":{"rendered":"Write of Passage: Lead Like a Pirate"},"content":{"rendered":"<!--[if lt IE 9]><script>document.createElement('audio');<\/script><![endif]-->\n<audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-6269-1\" preload=\"none\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"https:\/\/api.substack.com\/feed\/podcast\/180480203\/2a99a6fcf2a147a581b0112b077c9449.mp3?_=1\" \/><a href=\"https:\/\/api.substack.com\/feed\/podcast\/180480203\/2a99a6fcf2a147a581b0112b077c9449.mp3\">https:\/\/api.substack.com\/feed\/podcast\/180480203\/2a99a6fcf2a147a581b0112b077c9449.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n<p><p><strong>\u201cFor the women who do right.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>For the women who do wrong for the right reasons.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>For the women who burn it all down, find beauty in ashes.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>For the dreamers left behind\u2014keep sailing.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/p><div id=\"vanes-106184056\" class=\"vanes-content vanes-entity-placement\" style=\"margin-top: 2px;margin-right: 2px;margin-bottom: 2px;margin-left: 2px;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/vanessariley.com\/fireswordandsea.htm\" aria-label=\"Fire Sword &amp; Sea\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/FireSwordSea_HC-scaled.jpg?fit=1706%2C2560&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"Fire Sword &amp; Sea\"  srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/FireSwordSea_HC-scaled.jpg?w=1706&ssl=1 1706w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/FireSwordSea_HC-scaled.jpg?resize=200%2C300&ssl=1 200w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/FireSwordSea_HC-scaled.jpg?resize=683%2C1024&ssl=1 683w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/FireSwordSea_HC-scaled.jpg?resize=768%2C1152&ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/FireSwordSea_HC-scaled.jpg?resize=1024%2C1536&ssl=1 1024w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/FireSwordSea_HC-scaled.jpg?resize=1365%2C2048&ssl=1 1365w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/FireSwordSea_HC-scaled.jpg?w=1280&ssl=1 1280w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\" width=\"569\" height=\"853\"   \/><\/a><\/div>\n<p><strong>That is the dedication of <\/strong><strong><em>Fire Sword and Sea<\/em><\/strong><strong>. Four lines that came to me as a battle cry. It\u2019s a reminder that womanhood, especially when tied to leadership, has never been a straight line. It bends, curves, breaks, and rebuilds. It demands courage. It requires clarity. And sometimes, it lusts for fire.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Recently, a friend\u2014someone who does not read much historical fiction\u2014got an early look at <\/strong><strong><em>Fire Sword and Sea<\/em><\/strong><strong>. She\u2019s a reader of self-help, of business strategy, of the occasional thriller you can sneak into her hands. But she said something that stopped me cold:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u201cVanessa, you wrote a book about leadership\u2014about women\u2019s leadership.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>At first, I blinked. That wasn\u2019t the answer I was expecting. Yes, my heroine Jacquotte Delahaye is a pirate captain. And yes, pirate captains are leaders by definition. But what my friend saw was something deeper\u2014something I wasn\u2019t consciously aiming for but had apparently woven into every scene, every strike of a sword.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>On a pirate ship in the 1600s, leadership wasn\u2019t inherited; it was earned. Pirate vessels operated like meritocracies\u2014any race, any nationality could join, as long as they could pull their weight. Jacquotte rises the only way a woman in that era could: in disguise. Hidden behind lies, she relies on her skill with a rapier, her mastery of the sea, her stamina and grit, and her ability to steer a stolen ship through storms both literal and moral.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Pirates didn\u2019t buy their ships. They <\/strong><strong><em>took<\/em><\/strong><strong> them. And Jacquotte climbs the ladder of command one impossible task at a time.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Through <\/strong><strong><em>Fire Sword and Sea<\/em><\/strong><strong>, we see her rise, her missteps, her victories, her bruises\u2014physical and spiritual. And that, my friend said, is leadership.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>But leadership\u2014especially women\u2019s leadership\u2014is a complicated beast.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>We often talk about the women who lead in boardrooms, in startups, in medicine, in politics. But historically\u2014and even now\u2014women occupy the caregiver role by default. According to the report released in March by US Healthcare Workforce, 87 percent of nurses are women. The Bureau of Labor Statistics says 80 percent of healthcare workers are women. We are the hospice nurses, the physician assistants, the physical therapists. The ones tending to the young, the old, the fading, the forgotten. And in the 1600s, this was even more pronounced. Before physicians, there were women who gathered herbs, mixed tinctures, whispered prayers, held hands, and ushered people into life and into death and sometimes back again.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>To lead, sometimes that caregiving must be set aside. And that choice weighs heavy on nurturers.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Then there is modernity:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>How does being a mother affect leadership?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>How does being a wife?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>How does being the one expected to build the home, nurture the family, care for the elders and in-laws?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>I remember climbing the corporate ladder and watching women I admired\u2014women who mentored me\u2014delay motherhood until the last biologically viable second. One of my favorite bosses, a brilliant Irish PhD in physics, once had suits tailored specifically to hide her pregnancy. Because at that time, maternity leave and career advancement could not coexist in the same equation.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>This is the landscape women navigate. A landscape Jacquotte would have known in a different form, in a different century\u2014but it\u2019s still hauntingly familiar.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>My friend, though, wanted to talk about the dedication.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>For the women who do right.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>For the women who do wrong for the right reasons.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Because in leadership, there is always a moment\u2014a crossroads\u2014when doing the right thing may mean becoming complicit in something that isn\u2019t right. Sometimes survival demands choices you would never make in a perfect world.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>We see the consequences of hubris and hard choices in our real world today. Not to get too political, but right now there is a crisis in the Caribbean that breaks my heart. U.S. forces have fired on fishing vessels, claiming they carried drugs. But no proof has been given. Witness accounts suggest at least one boat was attacked without cause, leaving two people clinging for life. It seems a second strike was orders to kill defenseless victims.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>If drugs were aboard, they now sit at the bottom of the sea\u2014destroyed by the same guns that struck the fishermen. This needless killing violates the Geneva Convention, the rules of war and basic humanity.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>And now investigations must happen to see how leadership failed and who was complicit in illegal orders. It is a horrible situation when the people in all levels of the chain of command fail. It\u2019s horrid, that those below followed orders that were illegal. Leadership\u2014good or bad\u2014always has accomplices.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>And that is part of the burden.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>In <\/strong><strong><em>Fire Sword and Sea<\/em><\/strong><strong>, Jacquotte and her crew face their own moral storms. In the 1600s, the \u201ccurrency\u201d of the seas was not just gold or silver. It was <\/strong><strong><em>people<\/em><\/strong><strong>. African people. A horrid truth I confronted in my research was located in merchant records.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>I saw 17 guinea for a pewter bowl.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>At first, I thought they meant the coin minted for King Charles II with gold from the country Guinea. But the coin of popularity in the Caribbean. The Spanish silver pieces of eight were. It was upon further digging that these records were referring to people. Everyone from Africa are commonly called Guinea in the 1600s.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>So a pewter vessel was valued at <\/strong><strong><em>seventeen Guinea<\/em><\/strong><strong>. Seventeen human lives.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Imagine a world where a pewter bowl was worth more than a child.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>So yes\u2014<\/strong><strong><em>Fire Sword and Sea<\/em><\/strong><strong> has action and saga and mystery. But beneath the adventure, it wrestles with leadership, complicity, survival, and the cost of chasing freedom in a world built on stolen bodies.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><strong>This book asks questions:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>What does it take to lead?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>What is the price of doing the right thing?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>What happens when you must choose between your principles and your people?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>And how do women\u2014across eras\u2014navigate these impossible intersections of duty, ambition, and care?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>I cannot wait to have deeper conversations with you about these choices and about leadership.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>And so I return to Fire Sword and Sea\u2019s dedication:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>For the women who do right.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>For the women who do wrong for the right reasons.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>For the women who burn it all down, find beauty in ashes.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>For the dreamers left behind\u2014keep sailing.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Books to get us diving deeper into leadership are:<\/p>\n<p><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/bookshop.org\/a\/20190\/9780593355626\"><strong><em>The Soul of a Woman<\/em><\/strong><\/a><strong> \u2014 Isabel Allende<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>A reflective nonfiction exploration of feminism, aging, ambition, and the fight for autonomy across a lifetime.<\/p>\n<p><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/bookshop.org\/a\/20190\/9781668004074\"><strong>Take Care of Them Like My Own<\/strong><\/a><strong> \u2014 Dr. Ala Stanford<\/strong>: A powerful memoir of a Black woman surgeon who turned grief, racism, and systemic neglect into a movement that vaccinated and cared for thousands during COVID\u201119. Soror Ala is running for congress to lead the 3rd congressional district of Philadelphia.<\/p>\n<p><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/bookshop.org\/a\/20190\/9780316527194\"><strong><em>The Broken Earth Trilogy<\/em><\/strong><\/a><strong> \u2014 N.K. Jemisin<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>A brilliant speculative saga about oppressed women who wield world-shaking power, exploring trauma, leadership, survival, and righteous destruction.<\/p>\n<p><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/bookshop.org\/a\/20190\/9780593733769\"><strong>I, Medusa<\/strong><\/a><strong> \u2014 Ayana Gray<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>A bold, haunting retelling that gives Medusa her voice back, revealing the girl behind the myth and exploring power, wrath, injustice, and the cost of becoming the monster the world insists you are.<\/p>\n<p><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/bookshop.org\/a\/20190\/9780063397606\"><strong>Birth of a Dynasty <\/strong><\/a><strong>\u2014 Chinaza Bado (AKA JJ Mcavoy)<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>A sweeping tale of ambition, generational power, and the women who shape empires from the shadows, exploring the sacrifices, strategies, and emotional costs of building\u2014and defending\u2014a legacy.<\/p>\n<p><strong>We are six weeks away from the release of course <\/strong><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/foxtalebookshoppe.com\/book\/9780063271043\"><strong>Fire Sword and Sea<\/strong><\/a><strong> on January 13<\/strong><strong>th<\/strong><strong>, 2026. Caribbean women pirates\u2014Black women pirates join French and Indigenous women to sail the seas. Review this novel in <\/strong><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.edelweiss.plus\/?sku=0063271044\"><strong>Edelweiss<\/strong><\/a><strong> and <\/strong><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.netgalley.com\/catalog\/book\/726721\"><strong>NetGalley<\/strong><\/a><strong>. Vote for it on <\/strong><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.goodreads.com\/list\/show\/221554\"><strong>Goodreads<\/strong><\/a><strong>. Help me get folks talking about this novel.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>This week, I\u2019m highlighting <\/strong><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.baldwinandcobooks.com\"><strong>Baldwin and Company<\/strong><\/a><strong> through their website and <\/strong><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/bookshop.org\/shop\/baldwinandcompany\"><strong>Bookshop.org<\/strong><\/a><strong> .<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Consider purchasing Fire Sword and Sea from <\/strong><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/bookshop.org\/a\/20190\/9780063271043\"><strong>Baldwin and Company<\/strong><\/a><strong> or one of my partners in the fight<\/strong><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/vanessariley.com\/fireswordandsea.htm\"><strong>, bookstore\u2019s<\/strong><\/a><strong> large and small who are in this with me.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Come on my readers. Let\u2019s get everyone excited for truth.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Show notes include a list of the books mentioned in this broadcast.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>You can find my notes on Substack or on my website, <\/strong><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.vanessariley.com\/\"><strong>VanessaRiley.com<\/strong><\/a><strong> under the podcast link in the About tab.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Don\u2019t let this be a one-time thing\u2014like, share, and subscribe to join the growing family at <\/strong><strong><em>Write of Passage<\/em><\/strong><strong>. Welcome aboard this ship. I heart you.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Thank you for listening. Hopefully, you\u2019ll come again. This is Vanessa Riley.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p>This is a public episode. If you&#8217;d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit <a href=\"https:\/\/vanessariley.substack.com\/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&amp;utm_campaign=CTA_2\">vanessariley.substack.com\/subscribe<\/a><\/p>\n<div id=\"vanes-2786586735\" class=\"vanes-after-content vanes-entity-placement\" style=\"margin-top: 3px;margin-right: 3px;margin-bottom: 3px;margin-left: 3px;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/SubstackAd.png?fit=1080%2C1350&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"Listen to the Write of Passage Weekly Podcast\"  srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/SubstackAd.png?w=1080&ssl=1 1080w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/SubstackAd.png?resize=240%2C300&ssl=1 240w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/SubstackAd.png?resize=819%2C1024&ssl=1 819w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/SubstackAd.png?resize=768%2C960&ssl=1 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\" width=\"540\" height=\"675\"   \/><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u201cFor the women who do right. For the women who do wrong for the right reasons. For the women who burn it all down, find beauty in ashes. For the dreamers left behind\u2014keep sailing.\u201d That is the dedication of Fire Sword and Sea. Four lines that came to me as a battle cry. It\u2019s a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6270,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[81,793,9,620,756,694],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6269","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-personal-stories","category-politics","category-recommended-reading","category-syndication","category-technology","category-tv-and-film"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/fa490891347d8c071bd63e85a7f9dee7.jpg?fit=1280%2C720&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6269","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6269"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6269\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6270"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6269"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6269"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vanessariley.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6269"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}