The Rising of the Moon: A Nov - Tapa dura

Longing for a ship to captain in postwar France, young Mike takes a dubious smuggling job out of Tangier that eventually tests his temper and results in some near misses for his crew.

The Rising of the Moon is an immaculately crafted novel. Set in Tangier following World War II, it chronicles the odyssey of Mike, a young American merchant seaman in his twenties, broke, and adrift in postwar France. It is a tale of honesty, integrity, bravery, and friendship, as well as one of mutiny and murder.
Mike is looking for a ship to captain. The job he takes is a dubious one, smuggling contraband (and sometimes people) from Tangier to the south of France for a shady organization. His quick temper is born of a staunch defense of dignity and of his own ironclad sense of justice. His reckless bravery once saves his crew and once endangers them, and lands him in an Italian jail, where he barely escapes with his life. His journey takes us across the Mediterranean, and further into the dark hearts of cowards and the bright clarity of martyrdom.