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5. Surprises, Kindle deficiencies, etc.
This is a mop-up question for anything you want to say. For instance, I read this book on the Kindle and I think I missed out on some photos and maps that would be more readily accessible in a print copy. I was also a little non-plussed by the ending, primarily because I was set up by a YouTube reviewer who thought the trial portion was the most exciting part of the book. (I did not think that.)
Comments
I did it as an audio, so I even doubly missed them. I suppose there might have been a download package, but I didn't look. I thought the ending was fine, through I agree with you it was more denouement territory than the best part of the book. I didn't find the trial all that suspenseful, and the fact that the admiralty basically backed away from the case (presumably out of embarrassment) was actually a bit anti-climactic.
This part of the book reminded me of another micro-history book I read years ago called The Last Witch of Langenburg, which was about a woman in a small German town accused of witchcraft, and the trial that followed. As a trial story, it was more riveting, with more twists and turns, though it couldn't really compete on the survival aspects. Some time later I got to drive through the village and town and the landscape felt familiar to me, the book was that detailed.
I had no trouble picturing the island in this book, even without the photos. Thanks to several books I;ve read (including a Trail of Cthulhu scenario) set in remote southern islands like the Kerguelens and Bouvier islands, I've look at pictures of such places.
For some fiction set in the Furious Fifties, check out Jules Verne's A Sphinx of the Ice Fields (aka An Antarctic Mystery), Geoffrey Jenkins A Grue of Ice, and The White South by Hammond Innes.
"The Last Witch of Langenburg" sounds good.
I was misled by the Kindle page count. The book finished at about the 62% mark, and the page counts in the ToC were way off for the notes. That meant I was surprised by just how quickly the court martial was resolved! Yes, anti-climactic, but that's the true story being recounted.
Another question is how to mine this book for gaming inspiration. It's interesting to see what parts of the tale Grann concentrated on. He skipped over most of the detail of salvaging from the wreck, foraging for food, preparing the boats for sailing. In gaming terms, those were simple rolls with consequences, or maybe a skill challenge for preparing the boats. Where he concentrated was the pressures on the people and the dynamics of how the survivors did and didn't work together.
I think the "default" trad gaming approach to this situation would be to have lots of survival rolls and go into the detail of the mechanics of survival. I think this book shows that there's more gaming fun to be had by treating that part lightly.
Something I wondered was the choice of presentation of the material... I wondered if it would have been better presented in novel form rather than research summary for - sort of how Hilary Mantel writes about the Tudors. The same research would have been used, but maybe the point could have been got over more engagingly? As it was, some parts read like a story (e.g. the building tension on the island as the two main factions hardened their positions) but then it would drop back into analysis mode.
> I wondered if it would have been better presented in novel form rather than research summary for - sort of how Hilary Mantel writes about the Tudors. The same research would have been used, but maybe the point could have been got over more engagingly? As it was, some parts read like a story (e.g. the building tension on the island as the two main factions hardened their positions) but then it would drop back into analysis mode.
One way to test this is to read The Terror by Dan Simmons, and Erebus by Michael Palin - both of which I highly recommend. Though maybe not to everyone… The Terror has a fantastical element, and is filled with description of the effects of scurvy, and sailors jackets, and all kinds of things. As one commentator once said of Moby Dick “this book have everything.”
Desolation Island by Patrick O'Brian is an Aubrey/Maturin novel concerning a ship's crew surviving on the islands of Kerguelen in the far south of the Indian Ocean, and is riveting. His fictionalized book on the Wager affair, The Unknown Shore is good, but far less well written. It was one of his first novels, and he had not yet found his voice. I think this could be the core of a fascinating campaign, if handled correctly.
BTW - I have a signed serial print of Geoff Hunt's gorgeous cover for Desolation Island (https://www.scrimshawgallery.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Geoff-Hunt-Desolation-Island-1.jpg) framed and hanging over my dining table, flanked by two 19th century original ship paintings by a local New England artist.
How splendid!
I also realised belatedly that David Brann is author of several other books, all of which seem to deal with the behaviours of people, usually explorers of one kind or another, in extremis. So for example The Lost City of Z, dealing with exploring the Amazon for, well, a lost city, and the obsessions of those wanting to find it. And Killers of the Flower Moon, just released as a Scorsese film, So I don't imagine he's going to change his MO
Huh... I read Lost City of Z, and had utterly forgotten the Author's name!