William Martin Books In Order

Publication Order of Peter Fallon Books

Publication Order of San Francisco: The Luxury of Eccentricity Books

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

Publication Order of Anthologies

William Martin was raised in Massachusetts and went to Harvard University where he majored in English. He graduated in 1972. He later majored in motion pictures and graduated from Southern California University. Martin started his writing career with screenplays as he prepped for serious writing opportunities and publishing novels. His debut novel, Back Bay was released in 1979, sold millions of copies, became an instant hit and recognized as a New York best seller. William Martin has written numerous historical novels such as the Peter Fallon series, rising of the moon, Annapolis, and his latest edition Citizen Washington. Martin currently lives in Weston, Massachusetts with his family.

Back Bay #1Peter Fallon

Meet the Pratt class. A clan of ambitious individuals with a giant family business empire managed through six tumultuous generations. They would pursue lost treasure and twist family secrets into obnoxious feuds that could threaten the generational dynasty. Martin explores the scandals and dangerous exploits of the old Boston folk and how the dominant dynasties run their businesses. This whole saga paints an extraordinary portrayal of a prevailing family shadowed by historical forces and plagued by a heritage of lust, power, betrayal, and murder.

Peter Fallon is struggling with his Ph.D. dissertation at Harvard. While researching his thesis, he feels compelled to dig into the Paul Revere tea set, which remains a mystery since its disappearance over 150 years ago. As he probes deeper into the mystery, Peter discovers the particular tea set dates back to 1789. The protagonist is portrayed as a superhero, a macho push-over kind of guy who’s seen pushing his way with the leading lady and goes ahead to initiate a sexual moment even when the lady asks him to back off. She was still recovering from the devastation of her brother’s suicide days earlier. This part of the story felt like the writer expressing his fantasy, is somewhat a freaky wish list. He wants to be a hero, playboy, ladies love (I could be wrong) especially when his bedding ladies show their appreciation on the size of his erection, makes one uncomfortable.

The main story focuses on a wealthy family trying to save their corporation. Its packed with family feuds, politics and the intrigues of the stock market and hostile takeovers, nothing fancy, unless you’d like to take a free business course. The history of Boston is fun to read; it unravels a lot regarding the old school town and how the city grew with aristocratic families, it is quite thrilling and enjoyable.

Cape Cod

Another wealthy family classic novel set in Cape Cod. The Bigelows and the Hilyards run four centuries back having lived on Cape Cod for four generations of intense competition and misunderstanding while on Mayflower. Jack Hilyard is a dissident troublemaker, and Ezra Bigelow is the exact opposite. He carefully lives on set ideologies and believes in building his life on divine luck. The two men from rival traditional families have disputed about wealth, religion, land, racial preferences independence, and whatever pressing the issue in the present day. But it seems Christopher Jones, the Mayflower’s captain, wrote a diary about the trip, and that infuriating book has mysteriously gone missing on and off since his return to England. Jones writes of Governor Bradford’s wife baffling death, Ezra Bigelow last saw her alive.

The tension surrounding this latest development provides enough tension for each family to see the other go down in shame. The historical part of Cape Cod is wonderfully described, with engaging family tales. We get a preview of the 20th-century descendants in a longstanding feud about money and each family fiercely defending their wealth. The old and new tales are revealed accordingly, but the historical bit of the book sound more exciting and engaging than the present stories. Martin craftily steered clear of the managed to avoid the annoying relics and made it insightful about how the old age folk learned to endure hardship and how they held on land as their primary source of survival, heritage, pride and overall daily sustenance through agricultural activities.

Annapolis

Meet the traditional American family. The Staffords are a bunch of mixed personalities bound by a strong bond of family unity, ambition, and a fierce love for their country whose seas they must protect. From the Civil War, all the way through World War II, during the Vietnam War, and much later after the guns ceased blazing, this remarkable family recounts generations of hardship, passion, and triumph in a spellbinding, excellently researched story. The rich American tale comes in a large volume covering a large territory with a fictitious generational family with roots from the 17th Century in Maryland colony.

This story of the Stafford family provides a historical background of the United States Navy, with an account of its humble beginnings and pressing on to modern times where it is currently the largest navy-armed force in the world. The main story revolves around a journalist, Jack Stafford; a seventh generation in the Stafford family attempting to write his family’s story in a book. Jack discovers that it will not be comfortable to reveal to the world some of the eerily dirty secrets and personal details to the rest of the outside world.

Maryland County has produced the best of naval soldiers and army officials from the Stafford family. The Staffords pride itself of having bred an impressive generational line of naval officers who value tradition, and loyalty, clouded with a dash of insularity. Jack does not strictly fall in line with the long line of the staunch naval protocol. Jack’s novel and this thoroughly researched volume take us on a compressed but detailed journey of colonial settlement American history from, the days of slavery, large-scale plantation farming, through the revolution and controversial gunboat diplomacy with thug pirates. It then goes on to the infamous 1812 War, the fierce Spanish/American War and lastly through the long, heart wrenching emotional and physically draining World War II.

The narrative ends with a nasty battle with Jack’s nephew as the commander of a PBR in Mekong Delta, Vietnam part of the story remains tight-lipped, and the family seems reserved about the latest naval Stafford commander’s obligations and actions. It’s one of the best historical naval stories ever intricately told. It’s detailed, punchy, and downright entertaining. It is a perfect read for historical freaks such as myself.

One Response to “William Martin”

1. Johannes Bakk: 6 months ago

   I just learned about William Martin from an article about him in the Cape Cod magazine. What draws me to his work is: (1.) his going to write in his attic! and (2.) a novel I am working on which is a similar genre, featuring underground resistance to the Nazis in Amsterdam in 2084, after Hitler had been assasinated and his successor succeeded by NOT choosing to invade the Soviet Union and NOT pushing a “final solution”. But I am basically a non-fiction writer and editor. My creative writing professor at the University of South Alabama, Mobile, AL, was John Craig Stewart, a retired Major in the U.S. Army 1941-1945. He commented that my short story for his class reminded him of Thomas Mann.

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