Rating: 
Summary: The Perfect Storm is The Perfect Drama
Review: "Ferociously dramatic and vividly written"
"An indelible experience"
"One powerful piece of journalism"
"Harrowing, relentless"
"Terrifyingly, awesomely real"
"Frightened by nature's remorseless power."
Those are just a few excerpts from overwhelmingly positive reviews of this docudrama adventure - an emotional ride through "meteorological hell" on a 72-foot swordfish boat dragging 40 miles of fishing line through 100-foot waves in the "perfect" storm (a nor'easter that "could not possibly have been worse").
This true story delivers the powerful synergy of a combination of elements in perfect balance: high-seas drama that slams your emotions like the rogue wave that explodes windows in the wheelhouse...fresh imagery that draws you in and puts you helplessly amid the crashing waves and hurricane winds on the boat...and fascinating facts about storms, wave dynamics, fishing techniques, and much more.
Author Sebastian Junger, a journalist by trade, combines these various elements in a well-crafted story of lives affected forever by a series of decisions by six fishermen in the town of Gloucester, Maine.
The Perfect Storm, in a nutshell, is the story of a freak conjunction of weather systems that produced the most powerful storm of the 20th century off the coast of northern New England in October 1991. Caught in this maelstrom is a swordfishing fleet, in particular the Andrea Gail and its six-man crew. Building up to the frightening climax is the story of a fishing town, its people and culture, and the perils of daily life on board commercial fishing boats (generally acknowledged as the most dangerous profession). Yet it is also a story of how personal assumptions and decisions determine who will live to fish another day.
Unlike the trite, cardboard characters of many a fiction adventure, the real men and women who experienced this almost inconceivable storm come alive through Junger's careful and respectful representation of the facts. We get to know the tightly bonded folks at the Crow's Nest bar, where fishermen sometimes spend thousands of dollars of hard-earned wages in one night buying drinks for their friends. We get inside the lives of fishermen and their families, lives that would soon be forced to change in ways they always dreaded but never thought would happen to them. And we discover the misgivings and premonitions of crew members when the time came to load the Andrea Gail and head for one last run, ominously late in the season - warnings to which some listened, but others didn't.
As the story unfolds, we learn more than we ever thought we wanted to know about meteorology...dynamics of waves traveling across thousands of miles of ocean ("forty-five-foot breaking waves are much more destructive than rolling swells twice that size")...the rare monster rogue wave ("avalanches over the decks and buries the Andrea Gail under tons of water")...hard-learned techniques for finding and catching swordfish (a hook "can whiplash over the rail and snag people in all kinds of horrible ways" and "if it catches some part of the baiter's body or clothing, he goes over the side with it")...the economics of a competitive fishing industry that could force them to dump a month's worth of catch over the side...and open sea rescue procedures even more dangerous to the rescuers than the stranded crew. Perhaps the most fascinating discussion explores the physiological and psychological reactions of a human drowning at sea - when the body's natural reflexes kick in and panic is "mixed with an odd incredulity that this is actually happening...'So this is how my life finally ends.'"
Junger did a fine job of research and intelligent writing, skills gained from years of writing articles for such publications as Outside Magazine, American Heritage, and Men's Journal. His prose style is clean, highly readable, fresh, and full of vivid imagery:
"There's a certain amount of denial in swordfishing. The boats claw through a lot of bad weather, and the crews generally just batten down the hatches, turn on the VCR, and put their faith in the tensile strength of steel. Still, every man on a sword boat knows there are waves out there that can crack them open like a coconut."
Junger is faithful to the facts and avoids the usual writer's conceit of embellishing a story with assumptions about what characters said and did. Instead, he wanted to "step back and let the story speak for itself." As a result, we learn the facts Junger was able to gather through interviews and research, as well as how other fishermen described their similar near-death experiences, and our imagination takes over.
Even with so much detail - or perhaps because of it - we discover our emotions and fears swelling in proportion to the worsening storm, ever more gigantic waves, and gale-force winds. By the end, we have made and lost friends, vicariously gained a heightened fear and respect for the immense power of the ocean, and retained the indelible imprint on our psyche of this amazing drama. Readers of The Perfect Storm will discover a personal impact that establishes a new watermark for high seas drama and adventure.
Read the book. Experience the movie on a big screen when it comes out at the end of June. Then listen to your own premonitions to avoid being on any boat...in any storm...far out in the ocean...with nothing to do but wait helplessly for the next rogue wave to overtake you.
--
Roy Davis Varner, of Tampa, FL, is a professional writer and author of "A Matter of Risk, the true story of the CIA's Hughes Glomar Explorer covert mission to raise a sunken Russian nuclear submarine (available on Amazon).
Rating: 
Summary: EVER BEEN THERE?
Review: 9 OF 10 ADVENTURE STORIES (INC. WAR STORIES)i find lacking & Mr. Junger & His perfect storm qualifies.Perhaps as a novel it would have worked but unfortunetly it isn't that! While the best combat stories are NOT always written by those who've been there(and the same holds true for sea stories etc.-)the old journalism device of "joining the brotherhood" so as to "understand & qualify" generally doesn't work here.!Had Mr Junger been a commercial fisherman some years before writing his "storm " perhaps I could be less subjective.Conrad was a seaman not because He wanted a license to write! A working Class hero is still something to be (as Mr. Lennon said so well.)---"R.V.N. COMBAT INFANTRY 68-69,TAYLOR DIVING & SALVAGE North Sea -78-79 Ocean Sailor- Force 12experience-ongoing sailor.
Rating:
Summary: The Perfect Blunder
Review: I have never seen the movie so I'm not swayed by those discussions. I listen to at least one book on tape a week and enjoy this format for most books. I found the history of the boat, weather patterns, etc. interesting and enjoyable. The book was OK. But to listen to it was completely confusing. Three quarters of the way through he starts introducing new people and just gives a tiny bit of history of them and soon you're lost as to who he's talking about. If you're actually holding the book you can flip back and check yourself but to listen to it you just have to plow forward. To dedicate so much of the book to one crew and then suddenly jump to several other boats and many other people was just plain confusing. There is some sailor language.
Rating: 
Summary: A Fascinating Story!
Review: I read The Perfect Storm in every spare moment that I had. It is a wrenching story that grabs your interest immediately. Like watching the Titanic, all the while knowing the ship goes down, my heart ached for those men and their families as the book unfolds to its tragic end. Junger paints a vivid picture of Gloucester and its people. These fishermen are brave beyond belief. It must be in their blood, as no amount of money could entice the average person to face the dangers that they face.Granted, I did not understand all of the technical information included in this book and would have appreciated a diagram of the boat to help me out, but I found what I did understand to be completely fascinating. I learned things I never knew about fish, fishermen, the ocean, boats and the destructive forces of nature. I felt like I was out there on the sea with those men, and I was terrified. What more can you ask from a book than to learn something and be entertained completely? I will persuade everyone I can to read this book. I can't wait to read Linda Greenlaw's The Hungry Ocean, which I was given as a companion book to The Perfect Storm.
Rating:
Summary: Mesmerizing
Review: I usually don't read this type of book. With that said, let me also say that I picked up this book and didn't put it down until I finished the last word. This is not a fictionalized account of what the last moments on the Andrea Gail were like during that horrible 1991 storm. Don't read this expecting huge dramatic moments, overblown sensationalized heroics or a tragic love story. Granted, heroism, romance and drama are certainly involved in this tragic tale of real people facing real events. But what Junger manages to do is educate those of us who are bound to the land about the rigors, dangers and pleasures of those who work in the fishing industry. He weaves in some history of the industry, the fishing waters and of the crew of the A.G. themselves. He also provides some very detailed meteorological information along with specifics about marine behavior and tidal patterns. While reading this book, I would often close my eyes and try to imagine what it would be like to stand onboard facing a sheer wall of deadly water. Or to make the decision to risk my life to save someone else. The disapperance of the Andrea Gail is the focal point of the novel, but Junger also writes about the various rescue efforts taking place at sea during the worst storm in recorded history. Many people lost their lives, many others barely escaped death. This book brings all that to life. I give this book 5 stars because it is very rare for a true-to-life account to touch me and hold my attention for so long. Knowing the grim outcome of these events did not diminish the book's impact.
Rating:
Summary: A Great Read
Review: In The Perfect Storm, Sebastian Junger delivers a vivid and gripping tale of man versus nature. In a swift journalistic style, he tells the story of a freak monstrous storm and the people who found themselves in its grips on the sea.
In October 1991, three separate weather systems (an Arctic front, a low pressure system hurling eastward from the Great Lakes, and a powerful hurricane off the east coast) collided in the Atlantic Ocean. Unsuspecting crews on fishing boats, commercial vessels and pleasure craft found themselves in a vortex of exploding winds, torrential rains and towering waves.
Junger describes their plight and their struggles to survive what meteorologists called "the perfect storm." He also details the various rescue attempts by the Coast Guard and Air National Guard. But The Perfect Storm is not merely an action-packed page-turner. It's also an intimate and moving tale of life, love, loss and survival that will make you wish this were just a movie.
Rating:
Summary: The Perfect Journalism
Review: Regardless of personal choice, this book is an outstanding piece of journalism. The loss of the men in which you began to love as brothers, sons or friends; The tragedy of the fisherman; The bravery of the rescue services and the relentlessness of the most powerful force on Earth are all drawn together in a devistating and incredible tale. Forget the film - it's more than just disappointing in comparrison. The Perfect Storm is a modern classic and i'd recommend it without hesitation.
Rating: 
Summary: The Perfect Storm - I was Blown Away
Review: Sebastian Junger should be so flattered by the story that the screenplay writer and director molded out of his book. Going into the book with preset expectations, I was saddened and disappointed to find that the book does, indeed, live up to its title, period. More of a biography of the weather systems involved, than focusing on the crew of the Andrea Gail. Having seen the movie first, after reading the actual book I was left with a feeling of missing so much that was contained in the story-line of the movie. Had I read the book prior to viewing the movie, I would never have been inclined to do the latter.
If one has purchased the DVD and reviewed the special feature section, the commentary with Mr. Junger reveals the majority of the content of this book.
Realizing that movies can be quite different from the original writing and taking this into account, a review of the book on its own merit still leads this reader to say that it is more of an academic and fact-finding piece than a story with an on-going plot in which one may get caught-up.
Kudos to Director Wolfgang Peterson, who must have been looking through the eyes of a genius to see such a wonderful story in the midst of such a hodge-podge of facts.
On a more positive note, I now know how large a wave it would take to roll over or pitch-pole a boat of any given size. Also, having grown up on the coast of Florida, I have long agreed that fishing is an extremely dangerous trade. Knowing that the movie certainly resulted in the world realizing what a precarious profession fishing is, Mr. Junger deserves the credit for opening that door.
Thank you for this opportunity to express my thoughts on this book.
Sincerely,
Jessica
Rating:
Summary: Interesting Approach
Review: Sebastian Junger uses a fascinating approach to writing his nonfiction bestseller, The Perfect Storm. While Hollywood based its screen play primarily upon a fictitious account of what occurred on the Andrea Gail after the sword-fishing boat left Gloucester, Junger is less focal and more inclusive about other vessels and people that were affected by this most terrifying collision of storms. He is very careful to separate fact (validated by his research and interviews with pertinent people) from that which is speculated. In all, this book is an historical account that keeps the reader engaged, especially with the heroic stories of rescue. Unfortunately, six men lost their lives on the Andrea Gail thirteen years ago; however, the memory of these men live on through their friends, family, and community, as well as this book which serves as a fitting tribute.
Rating:
Summary: Sleek, Technical, Cold, and a Gripping Story
Review: This book had been languishing on my library shelf for some time and I wanted to get it read before the movie came out, invariably altering its impact. It did not disappoint. It must have been difficult writing a speculative account of the last few days of 6 men's lives, but Junger does makes an admirable attempt. Using what direct quotes he can, the story still comes off as rather detached, which I suppose can't be helped. The novel chronicles the final journey of the fishing vessel Andrea Gail, as it returns home on October 1991 hitting one of the worst storms of the century off the East Coast. The six crewmembers are adequately fleshed out in exposition early on, and their stories will intertwine with those of their searchers and fellow fisherman during their terrifying ordeal. I did find the numerous technical discussions of weather, sea-faring, rescue ops, etc. very interesting. Having just finished Isaac's Storm, another death and destruction by sea/hurricane historical novel I was particularly fascinated and frightened by Junger's clinical and emotionless description of the act of drowning. Considering how that description applied to the crew of the Andrea Gail as well as all those victims in the earlier novel, allowed for moments of morbid personal reflection. The novel really picks up, and is helped by the factual / eyewitness accounts of the other survivors of the Halloween Gale. The latter part of the novel dealing with the various rescues of other foundering ships makes for a quick and intense reading experience. It reads like an adventure story, but it is very sobering to stop and remember that these were real people with families and whose lives were cut so short. I can't imagine the upcoming movie will provide the experience and response the book did, I'm glad I got to it first. Recommended.
|
