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Summary: The perfect beach book!
Review: For anyone with an interest in the sea, this book is a must read. Although the author stretches a little (some of the "facts" just don't add up), and much of the speculation is overly dramatic, the total effect makes for quick and enjoyable reading.
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Summary: amazing real life account
Review: a must read for anyone who loves the ocean. not a huge reader and stayed very interested and excited.
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Summary: The worst book ever written
Review: How can anybody sing praise to this literary piece of junk? The author must have decided to capitalize on the popularity of "Into Thin Air" and put out a commercial account of an event that he has not witnessed and has no eyewitnesses. So being too poor of a writer to write a fiction novel with characters and action he compiles this textbook articles on the weather, fishing and drowning and sprinkles some speculation on what may have happened. Comparing this piece of garbage to the fascinating first-hand account of John Krakauer's is ludicrous. What a disappointment.
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Summary: A major disapointment
Review: I found myself much more interested in numerous sub-plots than the main story of the doomed Andrea Gail. Much to much technical information is given on waves,clouds and boats for this to be a truely gripping read (I thought at one point I was back in school wishing I were somewhere else). This was however Krakauers er, Jungers first book and it appears that he does have a future.
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Summary: Junger takes the reader into the monster of all storms
Review: In this spectacular book, Sebastian Junger vividly portrays what it is like for a sword-fishing boat and its crew attempting to ride out an horrendous storm. The book is a bit slow getting started- after reading the first couple of chapters one wonders whether the Andrea Gale will ever leave port. Eventually, however, he tells of the crew's journey to the Grand Banks off Newfoundland and sets the scene for their encounter with a rare confluence of meteorologic conditions feared by every mariner (and probably by every human being with a pulse)- gale force winds and waves approaching 80-100 feet. His account of the storm and the adventure of life on the crew of a swordfish boat are interesting and enthralling. Some of the main weaknesses of the book include: lack of significant character development; emphasis on a great deal of interesting but often extraneous technical data, speculation and secondhand accounts that sometimes conflict with one another. These detours occasionally serve to derail the power of the story, if only temporarily. On the whole it is a really cool book that is well worth reading. Morals of the story: 1) pay attention to storm warnings 2) be sure to have your survival suit and know where the life raft is located before you leave port. Enjoy the ride- if you can get beyond the natural human fear of the mighty ocean!
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Summary: Great book ... interesting reviews
Review: The reviews will give you a good idea of the book. For my part, I couldn't put it down. Yes, there are a few annoying copy-editing glitches. Yes, you need to have a brain and an attention span. I was amazed at seeing negative reviews here, but after reading them, I think I understand them a bit better. Some found the detail distracting or worse. Some looked for more excitement (and lost me right about there; I don't see how anyone would want or need more excitement in a book than they'd find in The Perfect Storm). One or two could be summed up along the lines of, "Gee, only a few people died and I didn't like them, so why should anyone care?" I'm not sure what you call that. Empty, I guess. I've bought copies for friends and will keep doing that. In my driver's manual, that comes under the heading of High Praise.
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Summary: it ain't over til it's over
Review: I read this last summer and it will always stay on my recommendation list. Hey, don't forget -- this is a true story! The author soaks you into the sea and never lets this tale dry up. And just when you think the really gripping part of the story is unfolding, there's the rescue! The Old Man and the Sea is a classic, but wait til you read this fish story. Whoa!
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Summary: The Perfect Storm is a marvel beyond exception.
Review: Not since Den of Thieves by James B. Steward have I been so engaged in a reading of a world I've never been able to truly appreciate because I am so far removed from it. Until the reading of this book, I have through the years, heard the occasional news item of a fishing boat gone down without empathy. Never again will I hear such news again without possessing a wondrous respect for the courageous hearts aboard. Sebastian Junger gives the reader a deeper appreciation for the Coast Guard as well. The Air Force, the ships that set out in blackness in unthinkable conditions turning into harms way to save a soul. The world could use more maritime ethiques. There is much selflessness and sacrifice imbued within the hearts of the characters to a level unthinkable. You get the sense that every life in peril brings about an extraordinary effort to search and find with genuine concern. Every attempt is made where many would proclaim impossibility. The characters that fill this book, men and women, are incredible human beings who somehow face terrifying conditions without cracking, without losing their sanity. I have a newly developed sense of wonder and respect for swordfisherman because of this book that also extends to all fisherman who travel well beyond the sight of land for weeks and months on end. I am enthralled. I am in awe. As with Den of Thieves, I was hard-pressed not to go back to page one and begin all over again.
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Summary: Rough Lives On Rough Seas
Review: Drinking, fishing...drinking, at sea...drinking, fighting...drinking to forget the next fishing trip. Junger's account is riveting. The reader will, forever after, imagine commercial fishing and the romance of the open sea with etched images of danger, despair, and moments of transcendent human courage. A great adventure.
Rating:
Summary: Curiously unsatisfying
Review: I'm struggling to explain why I didn't much like this book. I guess several things made it irritating for me. First, the Andrea Gail's crewmen aren't well developed as people--they come across as cardboard or stick figures, which is unfair to them. Same with events. No one knows what happened to the ship, and the book ends up being a sand castle of sensational speculation, much of it unnecessary and some of it, I thought, rather tasteless (especially the gratuitous description of the process of drowning). Second, the writing is laden with superlatives, and after a while, you just get tired of reading how everything is the greatest, the worst, the most powerful, the most sickening, the most awful, etc. As a result, I ended up feeling fatigued, and skimmed the last part of the book. At times it seemed that Junger wanted to give every sentence the rhetorical equivalent of an exclamation mark. I kept comparing "The Perfect Storm" to Farley Mowat's "Grey Seas Under," a book I read 15 or 20 years ago. I don't remember its content well, except that it also described rescues of seafarers off Nova Scotia and Newfoundland, but I do recall that Mowat's writing was more understated, and perhaps for that reason far more engaging, than that of "The Perfect Storm." Third, a book like this suffers from the lack of careful copy-editing. This probably isn't Junger's fault: it's the publisher's. The hardback edition has numerous typos or other glitches: St. John's, Nfld., is sometimes misspelled St. Johns (pp. 93, 94), "sunk" is given as the past tense of "sink" (p. 26), and the modern Portuguese word for cod, bacalhau, comes out baccalao (p. 24). There are other goofs, but no point in listing them all here--it would come across as pedantic. It just seems to me that publishers more and more are abandoning their responsibility to edit copy carefully.
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