A signal contribution to nautical Americana.
Nonfiction veteran Schumacher (Mr. Basketball, 2007, etc.) gives a graphic account of a 50-year-old maritime disaster.
On November 18, 1958, the limestone carrier Carl D. Bradley suddenly sunk to the bottom of Lake Michigan in fierce weather. Only two sailors from its crew of 35 survived after the huge vessel, more than 600 feet from bow to fantail, broke in half amidships. Launched in 1927, the hardworking ship was weather-beaten, rusty and popping rivets. But it was never determined whether the calamity was due to delayed maintenance or the captain’s faulty judgment. It might have been the rush to make port with a massive load that provoked the catastrophe, suggests Schumacher, who wrote of a similar disaster on Lake Superior in Mighty Fitz (2005). He details Carl D.’s sinking with articulate dispatch and sympathetic directness. The major part of his engrossing text concerns the mariners who went out and never returned, their families, the two survivors, the people of Rogers City, Mich. (the boat’s home port, where most of the crew lived) and the rescue teams from other nearby maritime towns. Rescue gave way to recovery efforts, then to wakes, an inconclusive Coast Guard Board of Inquiry and, most recently, exploratory visits to the broken ship resting in 350 feet of water. Moving this narrative smoothly and vividly through a half-century, the author lays claim to the title of master popular chronicler of Great Lake shipwrecks. Endmatter includes a necrology of crewmen, material from the Coast Guard inquiry and a superfluous glossary.
A signal contribution to nautical Americana.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-1-59691-484-1
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2008
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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