The Girl Explorers: The Untold Story of the Globetrotting Women Who Trekked, Flew, and Fought Their Way Around the World

Do not mistake The Girl Explorers to be a lightweight collection of mini-biographies of colorful females dressed in men's attire as they cheerfully cross the globe. 

These females battled every sort of prejudice mankind could cook up. They faced sexual predation and ridicule. They fought for equality and against racism. They exposed the horror of prisons and stood for gay rights. Their work was attacked, diminished, forgotten.  They were suffragettes and feminists and scientists and intrepid risk-takers.

Their achievements were significant, but how many can you recognize? 

Amelia Earhart, of course. We all know that she disappeared. She also wrote her own wedding vows that did not include "obey" but did allow for her husband's infidelity.

Margaret Mead had to be 'rediscovered,' for in her lifetime, she was accused of presenting fake science.

Jayne Zanglein's history of the Society of Women Geographers is about the women I wished I knew about when I was growing up, back when I was reading about Robert Falcon Scott's doomed expedition with nary a female in sight. 

No, the biographies I found about women were nurses and social workers and nuns and such. Traditional female roles, really, even if they were fierce. 

I did have Jane Goodall and Mary Leakey who I read about in dad's National Geographic magazines, and later in books which I bought. 

But so many of these women I had never heard of. 

Their stories are the story of women's progress in their fight to be accepted as equals to the ruling male scientists and explorers. They were more than men's equals in their intrepid spirit, intelligence, endurance, and persistence.

Their work is beautifully described in memorable stories that I will not soon forget. This is a fantastic history, and a must-read for every young woman who dreams of high adventure and scientific endeavors.

I was given a free ebook by the publisher through NetGalley. My review is fair and unbiased.

The Girl Explorers: The Untold Story of the Globetrotting Women Who Trekked, Flew, and Fought Their Way Around the World
by Jayne Zanglein
SOURCEBOOKS 
Pub Date: March 2, 2021
ISBN: 9781728215242
hardcover $25.99 (USD)

from the publisher

Never tell a woman where she doesn't belong.

In 1932, Roy Chapman Andrews, president of the men-only Explorers Club, boldly stated to hundreds of female students at Barnard College that "women are not adapted to exploration," and that women and exploration do not mix. He obviously didn't know a thing about either...

The Girl Explorers is the inspirational and untold story of the founding of the Society of Women Geographers—an organization of adventurous female world explorers—and how key members served as early advocates for human rights and paved the way for today's women scientists by scaling mountains, exploring the high seas, flying across the Atlantic, and recording the world through film, sculpture, and literature.

Follow in the footsteps of these rebellious women as they travel the globe in search of new species, widen the understanding of hidden cultures, and break records in spades. For these women dared to go where no woman—or man—had gone before, achieving the unthinkable and breaking through barriers to allow future generations to carry on their important and inspiring work.

The Girl Explorers is an inspiring examination of forgotten women from history, perfect for fans of bestselling narrative history books like The Radium Girls, The Woman Who Smashed Codes, and Rise of the Rocket Girls.

A Polar Affair: Antarctica's Forgotten Hero and the Secret Love Lives of Penguins by Lloyd Spencer Davis

My eye caught three things: Robert Falcon Scott--Antarctica--Penguins--and I submitted my request for the galley. Later I noted one other stand-out word: Sex. Specifically, the sex lives of penguins, but the book embraced more than just the birds' proclivities.

My first introduction to Antarctica was Mr. Popper's Penguins by Richard and Florence Atwater, which an elementary school teacher read aloud to my class. I read it many times. When I was about eleven years old I picked up The Great White South by Herbert Ponting, the photographer on the Scott Expedition to the South Pole. Scott's story caught my imagination. He was a tragic, flawed hero. Ever since, I have been drawn to read books about Polar expeditions and explorers. 

One of Herbert Ponting's amazing photographs

A Polar Affair by Llyod Spencer Davis is a highly readable and entertaining book about Davis's career in penguin research and the stories of the explorers who first encountered the Antarctic penguins. Specifically, George Murray Levick, physician with the Scott expedition, who became the first to record the habits and lives of penguins.

Levick wrote a book but it was never made public. When Davis discovered a copy he was shocked to learn that he was not the first to observe what Levick had already documented.

The book is a wonderful blend, offering science and nature, history, first-person account, and adventure. He vividly recounts the story of the men who vied to be the first to reach the South Pole, including their human frailties and ill-thought decisions. 

The story of Levick and two other men trapped over an Antarctic winter in an ice cave is especially horrifying to read! The harsh realities of the penguins' struggle to survive was eye-opening.

Davis's quest to understand Levick and the mystery of the suppressed research takes him across the world, snooping into libraries and museums. 

Even though I know the stories, I was riveted, especially since Davis includes the explorer's personal lives. As Davis writes, "Our idols are never so virtuous as we make them out to be."

The next visit I make to the Detroit Zoo Penguin Conservation Center I will be looking at the penguins with more appreciation.

I was given access to a free ebook through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

A Polar Affair: Antarctica's Forgotten Hero and the Secret Love Lives of Penguins

by Lloyd Spencer Davis

Pegasus Books

Pub Date 03 Sep 2019  

ISBN 9781643131252

PRICE $29.95 (USD)

Other books I have reviewed about Antarctic exploration:

To the Edges of the Earth by Edward J. Larson

https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2018/03/the-last-of-old-fashioned-heroes.html

Ice Ghosts: The Epic Hunt for the Lost Franklin Expedition by Paul Watson
https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2017/03/ice-ghosts-200-years-searching-for-lost.html

The White Darkness by David Grann
https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2018/10/white-darkness-by-david-grann-story-of.html

Fiction about Antarctica:

My Last Continent by Midge Raymond
https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/06/my-last-continent-by-midge-raymond.html

The Birthday Boys by Beryl Bainbridge
https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/10/the-birthday-boys-by-beryl-bainbridge.html

The Sun is a Compass by Caroline Van Hemert

I love a good adventure story and if it involves ice I'm in. Caroline Van Hemert's memoir The Sun is a Compass is a beautiful and thoughtful exposition on her love of the Alaskan wilderness and the 4,000-mile journey she and her spouse shared over six months. The memoir transcends the typical story of man (or woman) vs nature, for Van Hemert also documents her struggle to find her life path--will she be content in a research career, what about children, how long will their bodies allow them to follow their hearts?

Working in the field as a student, Alaskan native Van Hemert became interested in ornithology, and in particular why so many chickadees beaks were misformed. Lab work was soul-deadening. She and her husband Peter, who at eighteen trekked into Alaska and built his own cabin by hand, had long discussed a dream journey from the Pacific Northwest rain forest to the Arctic Circle. Before Van Hemert decided on her career path they committed to making their dream a reality.

Their journey took them across every challenging terrain and through every extreme weather imaginable, bringing them face-to-face with predator bear and migrating caribou, driven near crazy by mosquitoes swarms and nearly starving waiting for food drop-offs. But they also met hospitality in far distant corners and saw up close a quickly vanishing ecosystem.

It is a story of a marriage, as well; how Peter and Caroline depended on each other while carrying their own weight--literally, with seventy-pound supply packs.

I enjoyed reading this memoir on so many levels. Van Hemert has written a profound memoir on our vanishing wilderness and the hard decisions women scientists must make.

Learn more about the book, see a trailer, and read an excerpt at
 https://www.littlebrownspark.com/titles/caroline-van-hemert/the-sun-is-a-compass/9780316414425/

I thank the publisher who allowed me access to an egalley through NetGalley.

The Sun Is a Compass: A 4,000-Mile Journey into the Alaskan Wilds
by Caroline Van Hemert
Little, Brown and Company
Pub Date 19 Mar 2019 
ISBN: 9780316414425
PRICE: $27.00 (USD)

Adrift: A True Story of Tragedy in the Icy Atlantic and the One Who Lived to Tell About It

In Adrift, Brian Murphy recounts the journey of the packet ship John Rutledge from its navigation down the Mersey River to the ice fields that sank four ships in 1856. Nearly 1,000 souls died in three months, with commercial losses in the millions of dollars. The Irish immigrants and crew on board the Rutledge were all lost, save one man. This is his story.

I love a good adventure story, and if there are ships and ice involved, I'm all in. I was also interested in reading Brian Murphy's Adrift because it is about Irish immigrants, who in 1856 had scrimped and saved for their passage, hopeful they would find a better life in America. My own Irish ancestors left their homeland for England, a much shorter sea journey. But the reasons for leaving their homeland would have been the same, as well as their poverty.

The book is based on the story of Thomas Nye, a New Bedford maritime sailor who was twenty-two when he shipped on the packet ship John Rutledge out of Liverpool. The ship carried over 100 Irish passengers, bound for New York. 

In 1903, just two years before his death, a journalist interviewed Nye who told the story of the sinking of the Rutledge, his nine days asea watching the other survivors succumb to the elements and dehydration, and his providential rescue.

Murphy takes us on Nye's journey, recreating the events, drawing from Nye's writings, ships logs, and newspaper accounts. We are there when the ship strikes a berg and during the launching of the lifeboats. We experience Nye watching as his fellow passengers in an open board are driven to desperate measures and die until only he is left.

It is a tale of harrowing adventure, but also a study of human nature in desperate circumstances when conventional morality and social norms are washed away. There is no cannibalism involved, thankfully, for as Murphy shares, sometimes that did happen.

Reforms to improve maritime safety did not advance until the 1912 sinking of the Titanic. (Some things never change: the lives of impoverished immigrant families did not spur safety advances, but the deaths of some of the richest men in the world did.)

As climate change accelerates the calving of Greenland's ice sheet, more icebergs will clog shipping lanes. Today we have communication between ships and ship and shore, and knowledge of where the ice fields are.

Murphy is a journalist with the Washington Post and the author of three books.

I received a free ebook from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

Adrift: A True Story of Tragedy on the Icy Atlantic and the One Who Lived to Tell about It
by Brian Murphy
Da Capo Press
Pub Date 04 Sep 2018
ISBN: 9780306902000
Hardcover $27.00 (USD)

Young John Quincy Adams, Spy

John Quincy Adams [JQA] was a remarkable man who dedicated his life to public service. His training started early under his patriot parents John and Abigail Adams.

I have read multiple biographies of the family and somehow was not surprised to win The Adventures of Young John Quincy Adams: Sea Chase on Goodreads, even though it is written for young readers.

The author John Braddock was a case officer with the CIA and is a strategy consultant. His previous book is A Spy's Guide to Thinking.

The history behind the story in Sea Chase concerns the eventful journey across the Atlantic in 1778, when an eleven-year-old JQA accompanied his father to France to ask for French support of the American Revolution.

Reading Sea Chase, I had to keep in mind two things: my understanding of JQA and my memories of the historical fiction read in childhood that encouraged a lifelong interest in the American Revolution and history. When a teacher read Ben and Me by Robert Lawson to the class, I loved it and read it several times.  Of course, a mouse living in Benjamin Franklin's hat did not give him all his ideas. It was a device to catch a child's attention and interest. It worked.

In Sea Chase, the brilliant mind of JQA has yet to show itself. Instead, at least one person thinks he must have been adopted because he is so naive and clueless. The story is of the Education of John Quincy Adams (not to be confused with the autobiography of his grandson the Education of Henry Adams) in which JQA not only learns French from Dr. Noel, but the art of spycraft as well, involving critical thinking skills and discernment.

While his old man seems busy with papers and oblivious to what is going on around him, another unlikely characterization, JQA makes friends with other young travelers on the ship, including a cabin boy with a secret, suffers seasickness, and learns--literally--to climb the ropes. One night he overhears sailors talking, for there are British spies on board, and his inquisitive mind leads him into troubled waters. There is adventure ahead for the children.

As the good Doctor mentors JQA, he also is lectured about political philosophy and the superiority of Democratic and Christian values.

As a child, I loved adventure stories and stories on the high seas. I believe I would have liked this novel.

As an adult, I cringe at the characterization of JQA, for it is hard to believe he would have been such a dunce. And yet...what about that mouse who gave Ben Franklin his best ideas? I remind myself. It is fiction. For kids. And if that means that twenty years later they pick up a solid biography of the man who dedicated his life to his country, and who after a lackluster presidency returned to the House and argued for an end to slavery, I'm in.

Learn More About JQA:

Read about the quilt I made for John Quncy Adams at
https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2014/08/john-quincy-adams-champion-of-human.html

President's Quilt for John Quincy Adams made by Nancy A. Bekofske
for traveling exhibition by Sue Reich and appears in her book
Quilts Political and Presidential

John Quincy Adams and the Politics of Slavery
https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/12/in-his-own-words-john-quincy-adams-on.html

The Remarkable Life of Young John Quincy Adams
https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2014/09/portrait-of-president-as-young-man.html

Mr Adam's Last Crusade
https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2014/08/mr-adams-last-crusade-by-joseph-wheelan.html

And a book I have been reading, John Quincy Adams Militant Spirit
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/10/books/review/john-quincy-adams-militant-spirit-by-james-traub.html

The Last of the Old-Fashioned Heroes

One hundred years ago the world was reeling from WWI. Every value and belief once the foundation of civilization was called into question by the war.

But before the 'War to End All Wars' didn't end war, men were going on quests to conquer the unknown regions of ice. They faced gruesome suffering--loss of body parts that had frozen, physical exertion in extreme conditions, starvation, threats of crevasses that appeared out of nowhere and thin ice over frigid water.

For what? For glory.

The polar regions offered no gold or marketable flora or fauna, no open land for civilization to claim, no sunny beaches for tourism.

The men who raced to the poles or up the tallest mountains did it for fame and pride and for God and Country. They had something to prove and overwhelming ambition.

To The Edges of the Earth 1909, The Race for the Three Poles, and the Climax of the Age of Exploration recounts the explorers of 1909: Peary's expedition to reach the North Pole, Shackleton's expedition to reach the South Magnetic Pole, and the Duke of Abruzzo's reach for the 'Third Pole' in the Himalayas-- the dangerous K2.

I have loved exciting, thrilling, and horrifying adventure narratives since girlhood. One of my first heroes was Robert Falcon Scott after I read The Great White South about his failed expedition to the South Pole. I have also read books about mountain climbing and K2. I haven't a thread of adventure myself, preferring a comfy chair and a cup of tea while reading about someone else risking their life.

Edward J. Larson's account strips away myths about these men. Peary especially, who may have falsely claimed to have reached the North Pole and whose treatment of Inuit, including his teenage concubine, was by our standards appalling and predatory. And the poor Inuit dogs that Peary 'borrowed,' worked to death, then fed to the other dogs (or his men, as needed.)

Shackleton was better, but there was grumbling over his leadership skills, and he did decide to take ponies to the South Pole as well as an early gasoline engine car, both quite useless.

The rich, handsome Italian Duke seems to come off the best, with few negative stories about him, and his later siding with the Allied forces during WWII.

The explorers needed to raise money to fund the trips. Money was given by rich Gilded Age barons and in exchange, they could have landmarks named after them. Their stories were sold to newspapers and magazines and printed in books. They went on the Lyceum lecture circuit with magic lantern photographs.

Peary brought back Inuit for scientific study; when they died their bones were put on display! And he stole three, huge meteorites which the natives used for iron making.

Oh, the frozen toes! The shards of frozen snow that sliced through good English Gabardine! The suffering described is horrifying. (And to think, I don't read horror stories, or at least that is what I had thought. Turns out--I do!)

Shackleton failed to reach the pole, but he was knighted anyway. Scott was already planning his expedition to the South Pole, as was Admunson, and in 1911 Scott perished while Amundsen reached the pole. Shackleton was old news but still returned in 1914-16 on the Endurance. By then WWI had consumed the world and no one had interest in men fooling around in icy realms. Shackleton died of a heart attack on his way to try one more time to reach the pole.

No one really knows if it was Cook or Peary, or Peary's companion Henson, who reached the North Pole. Or if either reached it. With no solid land, the ice over open water offered huge challenges. There were ongoing battles over their claims and bad feelings which sullied Peary's reputation.

"The time was when the search for the North Pole stood for the very acme of uncommercialized heroism," wrote Dean Shailer Mathews of the University of Chicago divinity school. Those were the days, indeed. Today, the opening of the Arctic waters brings dreams of drilling for oil and dollar signs.

The Icebergs by Frederick Church

The 19th c saw the rise of the romanticizing of the Arctic-- the barren, uncharted expanses of ice captivating the imagination. Mary Shelley's Frankenstein retreats to the North Pole, Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins wrote the play The Frozen Deep, Frederick Church painted icebergs and Albert Bierstadt glaciers.

Could anyone then have imagined the aqua lung enabling men to view the ocean's bottom or an Endeavor that went into space? Or that the Arctic glaciers would be melting, the Arctic Ocean open and iceless?

I received a free e-book from the publisher through Edelweiss in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

To the Edges of the Earth
by Edward J. Larson
William Morrow
$29.99 hardcover
ISBN: 9780062564474

For more books on Polar expeditions:

Ice Ghosts: The Epic Hunt for the Lost Franklin Expedition
https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2017/03/ice-ghosts-200-years-searching-for-lost.html

Marooned in the Arctic: Ada Blackwell's Extraordinary Life
https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/03/marooned-in-arctic-ada-blackjacks.html

White Eskimo: Knud Rasmussen's Fearless Journey into the Heart of the Arctic
https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2015/11/an-explorer-of-people-knud-rasmussens.html

The Great White South by Herbert Ponting

Fiction about the Arctic and Antarctica:

My Last Continent by Midge Raymond
https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/06/my-last-continent-by-midge-raymond.html

The Birthday Boys by Beryl Bainbridge
https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/10/the-birthday-boys-by-beryl-bainbridge.html

To the Bright Edge of the World
https://theliteratequilter.blogspot.com/2016/09/to-bright-edge-of-world-by-eowyn-ivey.html

The Terror by Dan Simmons

A Guide to Life in Space from Tim Peake

It is amazing to consider that since 1961 when Yuri Gagarin became the first human in space that only 545 people have reached Earth's orbit. Tim Peake is one, having been on the International Space Station (ISS) in 2015. His book Ask an Astronaut: My Guide to Life in Space is as close as most of us will get to knowing what it is like.

When Tom Wolfe wrote The Right Stuff, he was talking about the first American astronauts who had come up from the ranks of pilots. Today's astronauts need very specific skills, including being good at language, since being in the ISS requires knowing Russian.

"NASA astronaut and ISS commander Scott Kelly told me that it is only the first ten years of studying Russian that are difficult."

The most important trait needed to be an astronaut is character and drive. Mike Massimino also wrote about that in his memoir Spaceman.

Peake wrote this book to answer the questions people ask all the time about being space. Chapters include Launch, Training, Life and Work on the ISS, Spacewalking, Earth and Space, Return to Earth, and Looking to the Future. There are great illustrations, diagrams, and color photographs.

I can't imagine living in 'a tin can' for months. And yet this is what today's astronauts do. And sharing that space with other people.

Okay, perhaps I can imagine that but I really can't imagine spacewalking. Leaving the 'safe haven' of the ISS for a black vacuum where temperatures can go from frigid to boiling in minutes, unprotected from various flying space stuff. One wrong move and--well, watch the movie Gravity and skip the happy ending. Peake notes it is actually quite easy to fall off the space station. The danger is palpable.

All this while wearing adult 'nappies'.

But other things can go wrong, too. In 1965 a Soviet astronaut was in space when his suit ballooned and stiffened. His hands and feet slipped from their places, and the only thing he could do was depressurize his suit. He was suffering from decompression sickness when, with much struggling, he entered the airlock.

Peake was part of a team to repair the ISS solar panel, restoring its electric power. Being in space gave him "the sensation of being a microscopic spectator in an immeasurably vast universe. It was, at the same time, the most astonishing and humbling experience of my life."

This is a great book for inquisitive minds, from the young to us older folk who grew up with the Space Race.

I received a free ebook from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

Ask an Astronaut: My Guide to Life in Space
by Tim Peake
Little, Brown and Company
Hardcover $26.00
ISBN: 9780316512787
Publication Date: October 17, 2017

See the book trailor at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PR-PdEqD82s

from the publisher:

What happens when you sneeze in space? Was it fun to do a space walk? How squashed were you in the capsule on the way back? What were your feelings as you looked down on Earth for the first time? Were you ever scared? Where to next-the Moon, Mars, or beyond? 

Based on his historic mission to the International Space Station, Ask an Astronaut is Tim Peake's guide to life in space, and his answers to the thousands of questions he has been asked since his return to Earth. With explanations ranging from the mundane--how do you wash your clothes or go to the bathroom while in orbit?--to the profound-do humans have a duty to explore the unknown?--all written in Tim's characteristically warm style, Tim shares his thoughts on every aspect of space exploration.  

From training for the mission to launch, to his historic spacewalk, to re-entry, he reveals for readers of all ages the cutting-edge science behind his groundbreaking experiments, and the wonders of daily life on board the International Space Station. 

We invite the public to join us in submitting new questions using the hashtag #askanastronaut, and the most exciting will be answered by Tim in the book, along with illustrations, diagrams, and never-before-seen photos.

The Birthday Boys by Beryl Bainbridge: The Lost Men of the Scott Expedition

I was about twelve when I picked up The Great White South from Dad's bookshelf and started reading. It was written by the Scott Antarctic expedition photographer Herbert Ponting.

In 1910, Captain Robert Falcon Scott sailed from Cardiff. His scientific expedition hoped to be the first to reach the South Pole. Everything went wrong, "the first great catastrophe on the record of Antarctic exploration," wrote the editor of Everybody's Magazine, which shared Ponting's photos and Scott's diary excerpts six months after Scott and his men were found dead.

During my junior high years, Capt. Robert Falcon Scott was my ideal tragic hero. I read The Great White South several times until the aged cover and pages began to separate. I was the only one of my friends who had even heard of the failed Scott expedition to the South Pole, just fifty years past.

I last read about Scott in The Worst Journey in the World by expedition member Aspeley Cherry-Garrard and  I May Be Some Time by Frances Spurfford, but that was about 10 years ago.

When I saw The Birthday Boys cover with its ship and masts on NetGalley, I clicked on it to see what it was (as I love sea stories) and as soon as I saw it was about Scott I put in my request to read.

Captain Robert Falcon Scott

The story is told through first person narratives of the five men who died trying to reach the Pole: Petty Officer Taft Evans, Dr. Edward Wilson, Capt. Robert F. Scott, Lt. Henry 'Birdie' Bowers, and Capt. Lawrence Oates. Bainbridge has created unique personalities for each narrator, vivid and full. From fundraising to setting sail to arrival at Antarctica to the last words spoken by Oates, the various impressions each had and the experiences of the men are revealed.

The men of the Scott Expedition

The challenges the men faced were overwhelming. A mistake, an accident, is fatal in the Antarctic. Scott's choice of machines and horses was a failure. The scientific research was curtailed by weather and the specimens lost. The men kept a stiff upper lip in their devotion to the old English standard of duty.

But the men also saw the coming end of the values of the old world. Dr. Wilson muses,"All the things we were taught to believe in, love of country, of Empire, of devotion to duty, are being held up to ridicule." Birdie responds that men are caught between the spiritual and material world, and "if we can't become saints then we must find a sort of balance which will allow us to be at peace with ourselves. All I know is, nothing matters a damn except that we should help one another."

The Antarctic demands the men help one another to survive. Although 'providence' seems to have saved the day several times, it is the men's devotion to the common good, "the missing link between God and man"--brotherly love--that keeps them going.

Each narrator's birthday is celebrated during their story. Oates story comes last, dated March 1912. Frostbite has turned to gangrene, and he knows his days are numbered, but he's kept it to himself. Oates has no love for Scott and credits his mistakes for causing misery. Life has become hellish and he recalls better times on the Terra Nova, when he shared his Boer War experience and injury, his homecoming, and his adventures across the world. He was certain Scott won't include him on the last leg of the journey to the Pole, and is surprised to be chosen.

Amundson, a Norwegian, had beaten them, his flag already planted when Scott and his men arrive. Then Taff showed his gangrenous hand. Wilson was snow-blind. Evans was 'soft in the brain' and under morphia. Birdie still worked hard to keep things going. But now, Oates has come to appreciate Scott and his strength of empathy.

On his birthday, Oates foot was far gone. He'd had a fretful night's sleep on morphia. That morning he tried to slip out of the tent, but was caught by Birdie. Oates told him, "I'm just going outside, and may be some time." And he walked into the blizzard.

I still get chocked up and teary.

Eight months after Scott, Wilson, and Bowers died in a cabin after burying Evans, and after Oates wandered into the cold and snow, their men found them. And in February 1913 the Terra Nova returned to New Zealand bearing the news of the brave comrade's deaths. Scott's diary and photos were turned over to his widow. Soon after, Everybody's Magazine received the documents, and supervised by Mr. Leonard Huxley, was preparing the story that was published in July 1913.

The Birthday Boys is a short novel, but if you don't know about the Scott expedition everything you need to know is contained in the story. It is a compelling and emotional journey. I highly recommend it.

I received a free e-book from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

The Birthday Boys
Beryl Bainbridge
Open Road Media
October 2, 2016
e-book ISBN 9781504039420

The Boer War, a Daring Escape, and the Making of Winston Churchill

Hero of the Empire: The Boer War, a Daring Escape, and the Making of Winston Churchill by Candice Millard is a riveting tale of adventure, providential happenstance, and determination.

At age 24 the pampered, dandy Winston Churchill believed he was destined to become Prime Minister of England and set out to be a war hero in the Boer War as his way to fame. Although officially a war correspondent he dived in to help when the British troop transport train he was on was wrecked; consequently when the Boers captured Winston he had been witnessed acting as a soldier. The capture of Lord Randolph Churchill's son was a glorious coup for the Boers, especially as the Lord had been very critical of the Boers.

Chaffing at imprisonment, even with the luxury of haircuts, ordering new suits, and gracious 'hosts', Winston forced his way into friends' escape plans. Sadly, Winston escaped but his friends were unable to join him, leaving him to face traveling 300 miles through enemy territory alone, unarmed, and without water or compass.

He was a very sure young man who relied on his intuition. Yet finding himself alone in the veldt and uncertain of how to proceed he broke down and prayed for guidance. The answer was to continue to follow his intuition. He walked to the lights of what turned out to be a Boer owned mining camp.

I was surprised to find myself laughing aloud by the amazing luck Churchill had during his escape. More amazing is that after reaching safety Winston turned around and returned to the war! It was the stepping stone he had hoped for, bringing him fame, and after the war he was elected to Parliament.

The British treatment of the Boers and the resulting war was not Britain's finest moment. Then, the Boers were not the finest example of colonists, either; they developed apartheid after all.

Churchill was a prolific writer and Millard allows us to hear Churchill's own words concerning his experiences.

Previously I also enjoyed reading Millard's River of Doubt about Teddy Roosevelts post-presidential exploration into the Amazon which nearly killed him.

I received a free ebook from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

Hero of the Empire
Candice Millard
Doubleday
Publication Sept 20, 2016
$21.99
ISBN: 9780385535748

My Last Continent by Midge Raymond: Antarctic Romance and Adventure

"Midge Raymond's phenomenal novel takes us on a voyage deep into the wonders of the Antarctic and the mysteries of the human heart...packed with emotional intelligence and high stakes--a harrowing, searching novel of love and loss in one of the most remote places on earth, a land of harsh beauty where even the smallest missteps have tragic consequences." from the publisher

It was World Penguin Day when I started reading  My Last Continent by Midge Raymond. I had not realized how perfectly timed my choice was. Raymond's novel is a love story, the love between star crossed lovers and their mutual love of penguins and the Antarctic.

from the author's blog

Deb and Keller are penguin researchers whose love affair flourishes only during their brief weeks together in Antarctica. Their off-season work is on opposite sides of the county, Driven by their need to make a difference and to save the penguins, both are willing to risk everything, even their lives and each other.

Shadows of Antarctic explorers are seen everywhere, foreshadowing the novel's climax.The ghosts of lonely deaths haunt the desolate landscape. Robert Falcon Scott's hut stands undisturbed. "I may be some time," said Capt. Oates as he left the tent shared with his imperiled Scott expedition explorers. He never returned. Deb's lover in passing, Dennis, likewise wandered off to his lonely death after being left behind by his tour boat.

The solitude of the icy desert, the isolation, soothes Deb. Part of Deb wants and needs solitude. Part of her fears dying alone. The memory of an emperor penguin who died alone haunts her. Female emperors leave their eggs under the male's care while she takes off to fatten up for nursing the chick. The males huddle together during the long months of darkness until nearly starved. Human males aren't programmed like the emperors. Before meeting Keller Deb had been alone, for what male was going to wait at home while she took off every year?

"Great God! This is an awful place," Robert Scott wrote in his journal. Tragedy comes into Deb's life and for the first time she realizes the depth of despair that prompted Scott's desperate cry. Keller's ship has hit an iceberg and is sinking and Deb is compelled to search for her beloved mate in the thrilling climax of the novel.

Antarctica is more than the backdrop for the novel, it is a living character. A hundred years ago the explorers vied to be the 'first'; today tourists tick it off  as the last of continent visited. The environmental destruction and pollution that comes with tourism, overfishing, and climate change all endanger the penguins. Raymond manages to educate readers through the characters and the action.

I loved this book. It is so original in concept and the writing is beautiful.

I received a free ebook from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

My Last Continent
by Midge Raymond
Scribner
Publication Date June 21, 2016
$26.00
ISBN:9781501124709

The Teller of Tales: Stevenson, Samoa, and The Last Bookaneer

I have been a long time Stevenson fan. I loved A Child's Garden of Verses as a girl. In third grade I discovered a slim biography on R. L. Stevenson in my classroom's small library. I read it several times, fascinated by his varied and romantic life. Some years ago I happened upon a tattered copy and picked it up. It was published in 1954, written by G. B. Stern and entitled Robert Louis Stevenson: The Man Who Wrote "Treasure Island. I had copies of Kidnapped and The Black Arrow; I loved the movie versions of Treasure Island. Some years ago I happened upon The Lighthouse Stevensons by Ella Bathurst and enjoyed it.

I have also been a Matthew Pearl fan since reading his first novel The Dante Club. His latest novel is The Bookaneers, a rollicking good read with lots of twists and turns and red herrings. A Bookaneer is Pearl's imagined literary pirates, back before the United States accepted European copywrite laws, vying to steal manuscripts to be sold to printers. Their idealized rationale was that literature must be available to the readers. Their motive, more than money, was pride in being the best thief.

Bookaneer Pen Davenport has asked bookseller Fergins to travel to Samoa with him as his sidekieck. Fergins was to record Davenport's last act as Bookaneer before the July 1, 1890 deadline when copyright laws are enacted in the United States. His object is to steal Robert Louis Stevenson's current novel. Their arch rival Belial has arrived before them, taking the role of a Marist priest to worm his way into the Stevenson household. Davenport is posing as a travel writer.

In 1889, after wandering the South Pacific, Stevenson settled in Samoa where he built a home, Vailima , where his and his wife and her children lived until his death in 1894. In The Bookaneers we meet Stevenson and learn about his life in Samoa and his 'lordship' over the natives who called him Tusitala-- The Teller of Tales. In a preliterate society without books, memorizing the tribal stories by a story teller was an important and revered role. Stevenson is a real presence, his lanky frame draped sideways over chairs, or sprawled on a bed surrounded by papers while writing.

The story is framed with Fergins telling his adventures with Davenport to a young friend, Mr. Clover, a dark skinned train waiter in love with books. Fergins himself is a Teller of Tales. This device allows Pearl to manipulate the plot in ingenious ways, keeping the reader on a roller coaster ride as Clover hears the story in pieces,and in the end goes on his own search for knowledge. Several times I thought the story had concluded; but one more twist was in store.

The book reminded me of an adventure tale, a romance like the old school stories of the 19th c. I enjoyed every minute.

I received a free ebook through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

The Last Bookaneer
Mathew Pearl
Penguin Press
Publication April 28, 2015
ISBN: 9781594204920
$27.95 hardcover

An Antarctic Mystery by Jules Verne

No doubt the following narrative will be received with entire incredulity, but I think it well that the public should be put in possession of the facts narrated in “An Antarctic Mystery.” The public is free to believe them or not, at its good pleasure.

Thus begins Jeorling's narrative of An Antarctic Mystery.

I follow Garrison Keiler's A Writers Almanac and learned that Sunday, February 8,  was the birthday of Jules Verne. I had read Verne as a kid but have not read him since I was perhaps 13. It was about time to revisit Verne.

I checked around for free e-books and came across An Antarctic Mystery. Being a sucker for polar exploration stories I settled on reading it.


I was happily surprised to learn that it was based on Edgar Allen Poe's 1837 novel The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket, using the story and characters in a kind of 1897 version of fan fiction.

Pym was inspired by a news story of a ship that sank. The subtitle is tells it all: Comprising the Details of Mutiny and Atrocious Butchery on Board the America Brig Grampus, on Her Way to the South Seas, in the Month of June, 1827. With an Account of the Recapture of the Vessel by the Survivors; Their Shipwreck and Subsequent Horrible Sufferings from Famine; Their Deliverance by Means of the British Schooner Jane Guy; the Brief Cruise of this Latter Vessel in the Atlantic Ocean; her Capture, and the Massacre of Her Crew Among a Group o Islands in the Eight-Fourth Parallel of Southern Latitude; Together with the Incredible Adventures and Discoveries Still Father South to Which that Distressing Calamity Gave Rise.

Verne imagines the captain of the Grampus has a brother who searches for him, and several characters whose deaths were erroneously reported. It would help to read Poe's novel first, but if you don't (I had not read Pym since I was in junior high) Verne offers enough information for the reader to understand the story.

Captain Guy's ship has come into port. American Jeorling is weary of the Desolation Islands and wants to board with the Grampus to get out of town. Guy won't agree to taking him on until he learns that Jeorling is from Connecticut and was familiar with Pym's narrative. Jeorling believes Poe's novel is fiction, although Poe in the novel refers to the story as a history. Guy argues it is fact.

"Captain! Why, that story is due to the powerful imagination of our great poet. It is a pure invention.”
“So, then, you don’t believe it, Mr. Jeorling?” said the captain, shrugging his shoulders three times.
“Neither I nor any other person believes it, Captain Guy, and you are the first I have heard maintain that it was anything but a mere romance.”
“Listen to me, then, Mr. Jeorling, for although this ‘romance’—as you call it—appeared only last year, it is none the less a reality. Although eleven years have elapsed since the facts occurred, they are none the less true, and we still await the ‘word’ of an enigma which will perhaps never be solved.”

It takes a while for Jeorling to change his mind, but he becomes as ardently monomaniacal about finding Pym and Len Guy as the captain. That way lies...shipwreck, mutiny, death, and lurid discoveries. I won't give away the story.

So then it was all true? Edgar Poe’s work was that of an historian, not a writer of romance?

I had great fun reading this book. I remembered my love of Verne's Journey To The Center of The Earth as a kid. The science is inaccurate, sure. The South Pole was not reached until 1911, so Verne in 1897 could imagine a polar world where summer reached 34 degrees and open water ran trough the continent of Antarctica. There is a dramatic rescue of a man overboard. No one would actually jump into the Antarctic sea, or could survive it. Critters and birds abound.


There is racial prejudice typical of Verne's time. The mysterious and heroic 'half-bred' from Indiana is very strange in physic and seemingly impervious to the elements. He has super sharp vision and a gruesome secret. The black cook's teeth shine white, and he is not very intelligent--typical of his race. (Poe's racism is also evident in Pym.)

I sped through the book in two sittings and enjoyed it very much. I loved the idea of Verne's writing a sequel to Poe's book.

To read about Poe's story:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Narrative_of_Arthur_Gordon_Pym_of_Nantucket
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/2149/2149-h/2149-h.htm
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/nov/24/arthur-gordon-pym-nantucket-edgar-allan-poe-100-novels

To read about Verne's story:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Antarctic_Mystery
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/10339/10339-h/10339-h.htm

Swiss Family Robinson

The Swiss Family Robinson

Johann David Wyss (1743 - 1818) was a Swiss pastor who wanted to teach his sons specific character strengths, including self-reliance. Wyss died leaving a disjointed collection of stories. The book was arranged and completed by Wyss's son Johann Rudolf Wyss (1781 – 1830).

The main character is a pastor who with his family were on their way to New Guinea when a storm over took their ship. They become stranded on a deserted island, but after devising ways to remove the animals and every useful item from the ship, they recreate civilization.

Since its initial publication in 1812 it has been translated and rewritten many times and was the basis for a Disney film and a television series.

I read the book several times when a girl and loved the Disney movie. Overall, this is a can do, positive, upbeat book. The characters never met a disaster or crisis they cannot handle. They seem to have read every book ever written on exploration, primitive cultures and their material world and industry, and every book on flora and fauna of the known universe.

Among the prickly stalks of the cactus and aloes, I perceived a plant with large pointed leaves, which I knew to be the karata. I pointed out to the boys its beautiful red flowers; the leaves are an excellent application to wounds, and thread is made from the filaments, and the pith of the stem is used by the savage tribes for tinder.

"How happy it is for us," said she [the other], "that you have devoted yourself to reading and study. In our ignorance we might have passed this treasure, without suspecting its value."

One problem after another is solved by the resourceful father and sons. Mother suffers a fall from the treehouse, one son suffers a serious burn and another son is shot, a hurricane destroys their fruit trees, and mom and a son are abducted by cannibals from the next island over. All crises are met head on and solved. Dad even makes rubber boots!

Warning: wild boar coming!

The second half of the book concerns Father and his older sons returning to find mother and the younger son missing. They fear that cannibals have abducted them. The menfolk sail to an island and after many adventures with 'savages' and a priest they are reunited.

Goodreads comments on the book are mostly negative, especially because the boys sometimes go around shooting animals willy-nilly.

The next morning, Ernest had used my bow, which I had given him, very skilfully; bringing down some dozens of small birds, a sort of ortolan, from the branches of our tree, where they assembled to feed on the figs. This induced them all to wish for such a weapon...I gave my boys leave to kill as many ortolans as they chose, for I knew that, half-roasted, and put into casks, covered with butter, they would keep for a length of time, and prove an invaluable resource in time of need.

We are today repelled by the sense that all creation is there for mankind to use. We know what happened to many species and to our environment as an outcome of that sad attitude towards creation.

We know that ostriches, wild boar, bears and penguins do not live side by side not to speak of kangaroos, pineapples, water buffalo and a multitude of other things the Robinsons find on their island. It is pretty absurd by today's knowledgeable readers.

The book is pre-novel in the way Robinson Crusoe is, episodic and without depth of character, lots of life instruction and little sense of plot. Wyss was to have told the book as a series of stories or tales.

Prayers for safe delivery

There is a strong religious ground to the novel, and 18^th c values are clear. Mom is revered and loved, a paragon of virtue. Father is a fount of wisdom, strength, and knowledge and clearly is in charge. The family always gives thanks to God their preserver, defender, and guide. The sons represent different personalities and are accepted and esteemed for the gifts God gave to them. Education and self-improvement are esteemed. And in all things they hold strong to their faith in God.

Our path became every instant more intricate, from the amazing quantity of creeping plants which choked the way, and obliged us to use the axe continually. The heat was excessive, and we got on slowly, when Ernest, always observing, and who was a little behind us, cried out, "Halt! a new and important discovery!" We returned, and he showed us, that from the stalk of one of the creepers we had cut with our axe, there was issuing clear, pure water. It was the liane rouge, which, in America, furnishes the hunter such a precious resource against thirst. Ernest was much pleased; he filled a cocoa-nut cup with the water, which flowed from the cut stalks like a fountain, and carried it to his mother, assuring her she might drink fearlessly; and we all had the comfort of allaying our thirst, and blessing the Gracious Hand who has placed this refreshing plant in the midst of the dry wilderness for the benefit of man.

Another aspect that upsets moderns sensibilities is the attitude towards the local indigenous people, the 'savages' who are just becoming Christianized. Just the use of the word savage sets one's teeth on edge.

So why did I love this book as a girl? It is clearly a 'boy's' book, with many adventures and more knowledge about how to identify and prepare edible vegetative matter than any fiction book ought to have in it.

1. It starts with a shipwreck---a storm has raged for six days already, and on the seventh day the ship strikes a rock. What can be more exciting than that?

2. Father and Mother are models of strength and courage. Every child believes their parents are--or wants to trust that their parents are--strong protectors they can rely on.

"Take courage," cried I, [the father] "there is yet hope for us; the vessel, in striking between the rocks, is fixed in a position which protects our cabin above the water, and if the wind should settle to-morrow, we may possibly reach the land."

This assurance calmed my children, and as usual, they depended on all I told them; they rejoiced that the heaving of the vessel had ceased, as, while it lasted, they were continually thrown against each other. My wife, more accustomed to read my countenance, discovered my uneasiness; and by a sign, I explained to her that I had lost all hope. I felt great consolation in seeing that she supported our misfortune with truly Christian resignation.

"Let us take some food," said she; "with the body, the mind is strengthened; this must be a night of trial."

3. They have adventures, suffer hardships, and are pressed to solve huge problems but prevail and flourish. Wish fulfillment! Illusions of superhuman ability! What child can resist!

4. The boys all have a special pet animal. They get to ride animals. They have two dogs. Kids love animals.

5. They live in a treehouse! They build a grotto in a cave. They live in a tent. What could be grander?

6. The boys are respected for their contributions to the welfare of the family. The older boys are relied upon to do adult work.

I don't expect to ever read Swiss Family Robinson again. But after rereading Robinson Crusoe, and as I have been revisiting childhood favorite books, it seemed fitting.

For an overview on the author, developent of the novel, and influences see:

http://www.jimandellen.org/montolieu/robinsonsuisse.html

Project Gutenberg's free ebook with illustrations can be found at:

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/11703/11703-h/11703-h.htm

The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe

In my father's library I found an 1888 illustrated Star Library edition of Daniel Defoe's classic story "The Life and Strange Adventures of  Robinson Crusoe, of York, Mariner: who lived eight-and-twenty years all alone in an uninhabited island on the coast of America, near the mouth of the great river Oroonoque; having been cast on shore by shipwreck, wherein all the men perished but himself.  With an account of how he was at last strangely delivered by Pirates. Written by himself."

I had read it in 1977 as part of an early novel class, along with Pilgrim's Progress by Paul Bunyan and Don Quixote by Cervantes, which my professor considered forerunners of the true novel. So I decided it was time to read Robinson Crusoe again.

Robinson was born in 1632 into an early version of the middle class and could expect to have a comfortable life...if he follows his father's example. But he lusts for adventure and runs away to become a sailor. After an initial bout with sea sickness, he finds he enjoys his new life. Until disaster strikes and a storm leaves him shipwrecked and enslaved. After some time Robinson plots his escape and once free he resumes a life on the sea.

Yet another shipwreck leaves him stranded on a deserted island in the Caribbean sea. And so begins the story we know so well, how Robinson survives 28 years with only goats, cats, and a dog as company until he discovers that cannibals bring their victims to the island to feast. One of those victims escapes, and when Robinson shoots his pursuers the victim becomes Robinson's chattel by choice. Robinson names him Friday for the day this occurred.

The book is full of adventure and danger, but it is also a virtual DIY guide to the most basic and ancient arts of manufacturing as Defoe explains how Robinson learns to make pottery, canoes, clothes, rediscovers agriculture, dries fruit and fish, and even makes an umbrella. This is possible for Robinson because of his worldly education as a sailor. He has seen the craft and arts of African and Brazilian natives. He also has all the time in the world to rediscover through trial and error the basic knowledge of primitive man. Arts forgotten by civilized, citified peoples.

Another aspect of the book not usually portrayed in popular culture retellings is Robinson's faith experience. The path to discovering a faith in God is as rocky as his road to rediscovering the ancient arts. He has found a bible on a shipwreck, and he sets to perfect his faith in God his preserver and only friend. Defoe was a Puritan and this story is an allegory, with Robinson's disobedience to his father paralleling the disobedience of Adam in the Garden.

Although considered the first "realistic" book, the story is episodic and jumps from one event, often a shipwreck or battle, to another.

Even though Robinson suffers enslavement, he later sells a boy into slavery or a kind of 10-year indenture, and at one point even runs a slave ship to Africa. Friday is his beloved sidekick, but he is also seen as a slave who loves his master and will do anything for him.

One of the more interesting aspects of the book is to view the story as an economic textbook for would-be imperialists. Not only does Robinson tames the wilds and cultivate it, he creates manufacturing. After he rescues Spanish pirates from the cannibals, Englishmen find the island and offer Robinson passage home. The Spaniards risk their lives in returning, so Robinson sets them up to remain on the island, leaving not only tools and corn but a detailed survival guide.

Back in England, Robinson discovers his Brazilian plantation has made him wealthy during his absence! He marries and has children but after his wife's death wanderlust comes over him and he desires to visit "his" island again. He finds the Spaniards have gone through numerous wars. He once again sets them up with all they need for European style society, acting as the 'governor' of his island.

After another ten years of wandering, during which time he has adventures across the world, including China and Russia, he returns to England and at age 72 is ready to retire.

The book has come to us as an adventure book for boys, but if one looks deeper, there is a lot to consider. Categorizing these classic books as children's literature sadly bring them out of the purview of serious adult readers who would see them on another level.