Larry Verstraete's Night Table recommendations
by McNally Robinson - Wednesday, Feb 03, 2010 at 10:21am
The Ice Master: The Doomed 1913 Voyage of the Karluk by Jennifer Niven

Much of my reading these days is related to topics I am writing and, as a result, leans heavily on non-fiction. At the moment, I am part-way through The Ice Master: The Doomed 1913 Voyage of the Karluk by Jennifer Niven (Hyperion, 2000). The Karluk was a former whaling ship converted to floating laboratory that left Victoria, British Columbia on June 1913 on a scientific mission headed by expedition leader Vilhjalmar Stefansson. Six weeks into the journey, the Karluk became locked in ice north of Alaska, pitting the 28 people aboard - scientists, Inuit hunters and sailors - in a life and death struggle against the elements. Only 17 survived the ordeal. Drawing on archival reports and the diaries of survivors, Niven recreates the story of the Karluk with such fluid detail that I feel that I am on the mission myself, experiencing the same rollercoaster ride of anxiety, fear and decision-making that the passengers on the ill-fated journey likely felt themselves. So far, the book has been a fascinating read.

Isaac's Storm by Erik Larson

A book that I just finished is Erik Larson's Issac's Storm (Vintage Books, 1999). Having thoroughly enjoyed a previous Larson book (The Devil in the White City) I had high expectations for this book about Isaac Cline, resident meteorologist for the U.S. Weather Bureau, who lived in Galveston, Texas at the time of the epic hurricane of September 8, 1900. Larson does not disappoint. He is a master of dynamic storytelling and impeccable research. By bringing minute details to the foreground, Larson paints a broad picture of the fateful day, and guides the reader through the struggles of the fledgling Weather Bureau and its representative, Cline, as the greatest natural disaster in American history bears down on Galveston. Suspenseful and informative from start to finish, I was entranced to the very end.

Next on the reading queue for me, another Larson book - Thunderstruck - the interwoven story of Hawley Crippen, a murderer, and Guglielmo Marconi, inventor of the wireless. Judging by Larson's record so far, I expect to be anchored to my chair for hours.

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Larry Verstraete (B.Sc, M.Ed.) is a Winnipeg writer and educator whose most recent book is At The Edge: Daring Acts in Desperate Times (Scholastic Canada, 2009), a collection of more than twenty true life stories about life-threatening situations and the wrenching choices made by the people facing them. He recently celebrated the book's launch on January 28th at the McNally Robinson Grant Park location.

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