The format for Shellabarger's historical novels varies little from book to book. The young, handsome, plucky hero finds himself caught up in the sweep of history — the conquest of Mexico, Italian unification, dynastic struggles in France, the siege of Quebec — in scenes of hairbreadth escapes and last minute rescues, torture and murder, swordplay and sieges. His enemies are dastardly dyed-in-thewool villains who eventually receive their deserved comeuppance. The ladies in his life range from alluring Venuses, engaging hussies with whom he momentarily dallies, to chaste Dianas, the ideal women of his dreams whom he marries, although in Captain from Castile it is the diamond-in-therough he weds and not the lady on the pedestal. On the whole, however, his heroes prefer swordplay to sex. There is certainly nothing in any of these books to cause a blush on the cheek of one of the young girls at...