The Strange Voyage of the Raconteur

Dave Jenkinson is a professor in the Faculty of Education at the University of Manitoba and the author of the “Portraits” section of Emergency Librarian.

Nova Scotia’s Oak Island and its fabled buried treasure were at the
core of Joan Clark’s historical fiction novel, The Hand of Robin
Squires, and Eric Walters’s whodunit, The Money Pit Mystery. Now, in a
novel that defies genre categorization (it contains elements of both
realistic fiction and thriller, plus tinges of high fantasy), Mills uses
the island as the intended hiding place for the Holy Grail.

Joseph Allenby, almost 17, feels drawn to sailing but has never sailed.
At the local marina, he encounters a newly arrived sailboat, the
Raconteur, crewed by Zen, a man in his late 50s. The next couple of days
become life-altering for Joe as Zen teaches him sailing fundamentals and
recounts stories surrounding the history of the Holy Grail and its
supposed whereabouts. What emerges is the story of a family whose honour
demands their upholding a commitment made in 1398 to Scotland’s Prince
Henry by Paolo Zeno, a brother of a famous Venetian seafaring navigator.
Over the centuries, Paolo’s promise—to guard with his life the
treasure the Prince entrusted to him—has been passed on to other
members of the Zeno family who have sailed endlessly about the world’s
oceans in order to keep the Holy Grail from being seized and destroyed
by “the dark seeker.” After revealing he is actually Joe’s father,
Zen informs Joe that he will become the next protector of the Holy
Grail.

Readers who enjoyed Michael Bedard’s A Darker Magic and Painted Devil
will be attracted to Mills’s novel. Recommended.