Product Description
Takes a voyage of discovery into the hidden world of shipwrecks and treasure. The book allows readers to sail with the crews who met their fate in dangerous and often uncharted waters, loot with the pirates and search for treasure with the salvage teams. Divided into two sections, the first part offers readers an illustrated account of 40 of the most interesting shipwrecks throughout history, plus 14 feature spreads on particular themes such as pirates and privateers. The second section contains 20 large-scale pictorial maps that plot the locations of over 1400 wrecks around the world together with information on each. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Well researched and well presented.
Shortly after this book was first published, I attended the London Dive Show and I recall how I had to convince the lady selling this particular book to let me purchase her last "counter" copy because she had sold out within a couple of hours of opening on that first day.

This book is a collection of shipwreck and treasure stories from ancient and modern times shown in the context of where they are in the world.Measuring 12½ in x 10¼ in (315mm x 260mm), it is packed with almost 200 pages of exactly the sort of information every diver wants to read.In short, this hardback book is a steal at £20.

A quick glance at the contents page reveals how the author uses the word world-wide theme of the book to good effect with chapters on; Bronze Age to Byzantium, Vikings, Chinese Junks, Levantine Trade, Portuguese Carracks, Armada, Spanish Plate Fleets, Pirates and Privateers, East Indiamen, Revolution, Great Collectors, Gold Rush, Mail Ships and Liners and ships from WW2. These are followed by carefully detailed Annexes which show; The relevant maps, shipwreck listings, glossary, bibliography, index and acknowledgements.

The treasures are enough to make any mouth water - and they are not yet all found. Altogether I consider this to be a scholarly piece of work - and no Divers bookshelf can be considered complete without a copy.

NM

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Product Description
This is the story of shipwrecks, and of the human drama played out in the throes of howling winter nor’easters, frozen rigging, tremendous seas, wrenching collisions, burning oil and exploding torpedoes. It is a story fraught with pathos and heroism, death and survival.

It is also the story of the evolution of ships and shipping, for in the approaches to New York lie the sunken hulks of hundreds of sips of every era and type, providing time capsules of the world’s maritime history for two centuries.

In the author’s lively historical narrative you will read about many types of vessels that now share a haunting grave beneath the cold Atlantic including: wooden warships, coastal schooners, sailing ships, armored cruisers, u-boats, rumrunners, tramp steamers, passenger liners, and revenue cutters.

Augmenting the text are over 200 color, and over 100 black and white historical photos, maps, and drawings of many of the ships as they lie today. Keyed to the drawings are photos of the highlights of the wrecks. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Finest Kind
Although there are now many books extant on shipwrecks and shipwreck lore this work stands out head and shoulders above the rest. It's area of provenence is that of the Approaches to New York, an area that also includes a huge graveyard of ships long known to sailors as the New York Bight. This area of the coast is home to many a maritime disaster running the gamut from vessels lost to storm and tempest, to those lost in collisions and to other misfortune, and also the many victims of the U-Boat campaigns of WWI and WWII. Tugboats, tankers, freighters, warships and submarines, they are all here to the delight of many a shipwreck diver and reader.

Many fantastic and historic wrecks, such as the famous Grand Dame of the Sea the Andrea Doria and the WWI Battlecruiser San Diego are discussed in detail here.

Author Bradley Sheard's outstanding effort spans two centuries of maritime history as it thoroughly and entertainingly documents the fate of numerous shipwrecks. The book contains a beautifully written textual history supported by outstanding photographs taken by the author along with a good mix of well researched archival material. There are also many carefully and accurately done drawings illustrating the wrecks themselves as they now rest on the sea floor.

The author has obviously gone the extra mile to combine exhaustive research with first hand diving experience to provide the reader with a type of description that brings these shipwrecks to life with many amazing stories of ships and their people that is high drama as only as disaster at sea can be. Bradley Sheard was a member of the legendary Atlantic Wreck Divers and is also one of wreck diving's most skillful and articulate practitioners.

I close by saying that I have dived many of these shipwrecks and the book enriches my own memories wonderfully and I am compelled to say to Mr. Sheard, in the terms of an East Coast Waterman, well done and "Finest Kind!"

The Wreck Hunters: Dive to the Wreck of the USS Bass

Another of New York's Finest.
"Two centuries of Shipwrecks in the Approaches to New York" it says on the cover - and that just about says it all.They include HMS Culloden - lost off Long Islandin 1781 and the USS San Diego - a four-funnelled armoured cruiser and the only major US Warship lost during WW1.There are tankers and freighters and even one or two U-Boats that sank some of them.There are Cruise Liners from the earliest days of passenger travel, right up to the Andrea Doria - still so sleek and beautiful, it really is hard to believe she was lost in 1956 - almost 50 years ago already.

Lost Voyages is paperback measuring approx. 11½ in x 8½ and filled with over 200 pages of detailed information, historic photographs, underwater photographs, sketches, maps and sectional drawings. Expertly crafted, the book is laid out from the earliest days of America - as a fledgling nation, at Sea right up to the present.With chapters dedicated to; Wooden Warships, Sailing Merchant Ships, the Ascendancy of the Steamship, Ships that ran Aground, the 1914-1918 War, Between the Wars, WW2 and the Era of Modern Navigation, this is a fascinating voyage through the Shipwrecks of time in this one small corner of the world.

The layout, and combination of historic and up-to-date information have been engineered in such a way as to provide the reader with a fascinating insight into the maritime casualties off one major American seaport.

From a Scuba Diver's perspective, these shipwrecks are easily "New York's finest" making this an essential addition to any bookshelf.Once read by any diver - even if you don't live in New York, you just know you will "have" to dive some of these wrecks - someday...

NM

Lost Voyages
I think this has to be one of the best shipwreck books I have ever read. Not only does it give detailed accounts of the events leafing up to and including the sinkings, it's packed full of maps, photos, evn drawings ofthe present state of the wrecks. I think this is probably a must-read. ... Read more

Product Description

Customer Reviews (5)

Made my 25 best reads of 2009.
Bella Bathurst, The Wreckers: A Story of Killing Seas and Plundered Shipwrecks from the 18th Century to the Present Day (Houghton Mifflin, 2005)

While I was coming up with my Best Reads of 2009 list, I found that I'd somehow forgotten to write a review of Bella Bathurst's The Wreckers, the book which clocked in at #16 on that list. It's almost two months later, and I still haven't written that review. I finished the book back in October 2009, and I'm writing this on February 15, 2010. (Note: there is no guarantee I will finish this review on February 15; I always have a few stubs lying around waiting for me to finish them.) So I'm a little fuzzy on the details, but I've got the structure firmly in my head; The Wreckers will be with me for much longer than this, rest you assured. Bella Bathurst has written my favorite kind of nonfiction book here, one that manages both the readability of a conversational tone and ample evidence of research. One in which the author is personally invested, but in which the author is not enough of an egoist to turn the entire book into a memoir that's related only tangentially to the purported subject. It is a book that is in balance. Given that, Bathurst could have probably written about any topic from the weather patterns of the South Atlantic to the population density of Norwegian emigrants in Tibet and I'd have liked the book. But her subject, as well, is intrinsically fascinating: wreckers and the many other sub-groups that go along with them, from those with complete legitimacy (the salvors) to those who might as well be flying the black flag (may as well call them pirates, for in the final analysis, that's what they are).

Bathurst wanders coastal Britain interviewing salvors, wreckers, and associated folks, looking at shipwrecks, and tracing the histories of some of Britain's most dangerous stretches of coastline, examining the way wreckers have been portrayed in popular culture and law before examining as much of the history as she can find. As we see different pieces of the coastline (and jet off for an epilogue in India), a picture emerges that is quite different than the one we're all used to. Granted, when much of your history is coming from those involved, it's worth taking it all with a couple of grains of salt. But whatever opinions you've formed by the end of the book, it's an absorbing journey through a lifestyle that's been slowly dying out over the past decades, and one that's well worth your time. ****

The Wreckers
I quite enjoyed this well-written history of wrecking along the coasts of the Bristish Isles. The author did a wonderful job of interviewing some of the elderly folks around the country that were able to supply some of the kind of history (With a few embellishments I'm sure.) that would otherwise be lost forever once they are gone. I also received an unexpected education about the geology of Great Britain and bit of oceanography that was a pleasant addition to the text. I thought the book was entertaining and easy to read. In fact, I've since purchased another copy to give as a gift.

Mostly rubbish....
The main problem with this book is that it confuses the definition of what constitutes a 'wrecker,' with what constitutes a 'salvager.'The two are very different, even though they both deal with shipwrecks.The wrecker encourages or lures ships to crash onto the rocks and reefs, and thus benefitting from the resulting valuable cargo from the wreck at the cost of the lives of the sailors on the vessel so wrecked.A salvager simply benefits from the recovery of the cargo of a vessel that has wrecked itself, and ordinarily after rescuing the crewmen aboard forst.Two very different things!This book is about salvagers, not wreckers!To be fair, I believe Ms Bathurst originally intended to write about wreckers, but because her research methodology was so weak, she simply switched to writing about salvagers without changing the title of the book.The failure of her methodology for obtaining original source information is hardly surprising; if you simply walk into waterfront pubs as a stranger and start asking people if they were, or know anything about wreckers, they will understandably all deny any knowledge.You might well ask them if they were murderers, or criminally insane!Information of this sort is very closely held, very rarely divulged, or even spoken about, and certainly never to strangers!In any case, if you would like to read a book about salvagers from around the British Isles, this may be your cup of tea.If you are looking for information about wreckers, this ain't it!

Fascinating Look Into A Little-Known Area
We all know about shipwrecks, but I had never heard of people who make a living off of these tragedies - even whole communities that basically lie in wait for these wrecks to happen - until I stumbled on this book.

Bella Bathurst's look into Wreckers is really interesting, though a tad overwritten.Nonetheless, it's totally worth reading.She's particularly good at capturing the personalities of the people involved, as well as giving a great historical overview of this bizarre and fascinating pocket of human life.

If you like books about seafaring, this is a great little detour.

Lively Tales of Rocky Seas and Rocky Morals
You are walking along the beach, and you find a box that has obviously washed up from the sea.You look inside, and find something valuable.What do you do?For almost anyone, this is as clear a case of finders keepers as can be.But what if you saw the ship on the rocks from which the box came?What if you rowed out deliberately to take such boxes from the foundering ship?What if in rescuing boxes you refused to rescue passengers?What if you had lured the ship upon the rocks deliberately by making a false lighthouse?The wreckers can tell you the answers to these questions, if you can get any of them to make frank replies.Wreckers are those who are eager to claim soon-to-be-lost cargo as their own, and the history of British wreckers (frank replies and all) is told in _The Wreckers: A Story of Killing Seas and Plundered Shipwrecks, from the 18th Century to the Present Day_ (Houghton Mifflin) by Bella Bathurst.The author's previous book, on the lighthouse-building family of Robert Louis Stevenson, was a sort of preparation for the current one, the light as opposed to the dark.It is full of death, riches, and good and bad luck, and therefore cannot help being fascinating.

The complicated legal status of wrecks, wreckers, and wreckage is here covered in detail, but it is fair to say it is not made plain.No English law has supported "finders keepers" in any form, but wreckers pretty much depend upon it.After all, as Bathurst invites us to consider, if a foundering ship has been properly evacuated of all its crew, and it is about to break up with all its goods going to the bottom, what can possibly be wrong with nimble wreckers climbing aboard and plucking whatever they can?It's a different issue from wreckers luring ships to their doom.Go to Cornwall now, the setting for _Jamaica Inn_, and they will sell you souvenirs from the age when wreckers deliberately wrecked ships, and they will deny that such things ever occurred.There is much less malevolence described on most of these pages, although they are full of those who live by the sea and try to profit thereby.If you don't like the dark of _Jamaica Inn_, which may or may not be based on real history, try the rollicking _Whiskey Galore_, which is really based on the sinking of the _Politician_, with a quarter million barrels of malt whisky, wrecked off parched isles of Scotland in 1941.The _Cita_ ran aground on the Isles of Scilly in 1997 and gave the islanders tons of toys, car engines, and brand name Nike trainers. These are fine stories that anyone will enjoy, because wrecks are inherently fascinating.One man who photographs says anyone will go look at them, "Not necessarily to go and pick it over, but just to go and see it.It seems to create an awful lot of interest in people."

Just so this book.Bathurst has visited the locales described, and most importantly, has actually sailed these dangerous waters, with expert local guides.Off Scotland, for instance, is the Gulf of Corrievreckan, with monstrous rocks and a subaquatic pit known as "the Gateway to Hell".Bathurst is mystified by her scary visit: "A couple of hours ago, I though I understood the laws of physics."Valleys of water, liquid obstructions, and boiling cold water teach her differently.A captain unaware might be sailing along, only to realize that a great pit of water is opening in front of him and there is nothing his vessel can do.The Goodwin Sands, near the narrowest part of the English Channel, are islands that can disappear or reappear irregularly, depending upon how the sands shift, and since they are in a busy waterway, they have dragged innumerable ships down.The wreckers (locally called "levellers") assist such vessels if they can, but pick up whatever merchandise they can, too.Even the members of the legendary and fully respected Royal National Lifeboat Institution, one man says, would get to a wreck first and rescue the survivors, and then "... if they got some perks of it, well..."This is an engaging tale of the gusto of sea life, of unsure waters, and of uncertain morality.


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Product Description
Dick Leslie's Luck - A Story of Shipwreck and Adventure is presented here in a high quality paperback edition. This popular classic work by Harry Collingwood is in the English language. If you enjoy the works of Harry Collingwood then we highly recommend this publication for your book collection. ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (3)

Amazing
I can't add much more to what the previous reviewers have said, save to add another voice praising this book.It's a nail biter...

Having finished the book, all I can wonder is why the Coast Guard doesn't get more recognition for the amazing, and often, superhuman feats that these folks perform in the course of their professions!

Wonderful job, Spike!

Word Painting at it's Best
Spike Walker is a man's man. He knows both the joy and elation of great success under the worst circumstances, as well as the horror of realized failure right down to the soul. In this case, his amazing ability to use words to paint the picture and elicit an emotion takes the reader on the same emotional rollercoaster ride.

This book tells of bravery, fear, selfless sacrifice and success under some of the worst conditions imaginable. By the end, the reader feels both the sense of satisfaction and great loss felt by the heroes of this story, both at the same time.

I've read all of Spike's books. They're all excellent, but this one edges the others. "On the Edge of Survival" is a must read if you are a real-life adventure story fan.

Great Job, Spike!

INTENSE!
"This modern-day story of a shipwreck on what I could only describe as a cruel December night up in Alaska's notorious Bering Sea, and the attempts to rescue those in peril is INTENSE! It reads like one of those tales by Jack London, except this one is entirely true. Anyway, I thoroughly enjoyed it.
After setting up this dramatic story, and briefly introducing the main characters, the author deftly guided me through some 200 pages plus of non-stop action. As the plot unfolded, I found myself drawn in closer and closer to this edge-of-your-seat adventure, until I almost had to force myself to breathe. The descriptions of that massive ship running onto the rocks and breaking in two was like something out of the movie TITANIC. And the giant rogue wave that came out of the night and washed the Coast Guard H60 Jayhawk helicopter (carrying three of the helo's crew and seven recently rescued members of the ship's crew) out of the sky and sent it crashing into the sea, as well as the panicked efforts of those attempting to swim out of the wreckage, was all unforgetable. My heart goes out to those poor souls (many with families) who died trying. More than a few were swept into the deadly surf nearby and vanished forever, never to be seen again.
This book was a great reading experience. But I did come away from it wanting something more. Someday I would like to meet Aaron Bean, that tenacious, tough-as-nails young rescue swimmer. His heroic devotion to duty while being trapped for hours in what was an absolutely impossible, life and death situation, made all the difference to one lucky sailor, and won me over completely. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Santa Barbara Channel Shipwrecks
An informative and well researched book written with several generations of local knowledge.Highly recommended for marine historians, shipwreck enthusiasts and sailors alike. ... Read more

Product Description
A survey of the maritime history of the New World. The book brings together the work of leading nautical archaeologists, each with first-hand diving experience. Twelve chapters tell the story of watercraft in the Americas, accompanied by photographs, paintings, diagrams, charts and maps. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Not A Bed-side Reader
This is definitely a text book. Written likely to be used in conjunction with a lecture of sorts, this book is excellent if you're teaching a course on the subject of post-medeival seafaring, however, it'd also be a good book is you're interested in the subject and don't mind fighting through a text book.

The book discusses the structural and functional evolution of watercraft after the medeival ages, the economic and political effects of naval construction and advancement, and discusses in detail a number of nautical archaeological excavations of important shipwrecks in the New World. ... Read more

Product Description
An excellent addition to any maritime history collection! Vintage maps and illustrations, historic photos, and detailed charts highlight this extensive volume. Featured are detailed accounts of disasters involving significant loss of life or property, or those that were particularly harrowing. This is the most comprehensive, accurate collection of information ever compiled about the legendary wrecks on Lake Michigan from 1800 to present. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

A Superficial Treatment of the Subject
I found this book to be a relatively superficial analysis of the subject of Lake Michigan shipwrecks.I have researched Lake Michigan shipwrecks for 20 years and I own several hundred books about Great Lakes shipwrecks and nearly 100 titles about Lake Michigan shipwrecks specifically.Comparatively speaking, this book is very superficial.The book treats a few hundred Lake Michigan wrecks and fails to even mention that at least 2000 other historically verified total loss Lake Michigan shipwrecks are known.I also noted several relatively serious factual errors in the specific wreck accounts.All the wrecks detailed in this book are already covered in existing books and it appeared that little original archival research went into the book's preparation, as evidenced by the book's bibliography.The book would have benefited from some contextual historical material about the social and economic conditions that caused so many wrecks on Lake Michigan.I believe any reader with a background in Lake Michigan maritime history will be disappointed by this book's lack of perpective, historical context and depth.

Meticulously researched and deftly written
Shipwrecks Of Lake Michigan by Great Lakes expert Benjamin J. Shelak provides the reader with an impressively detailed and comprehensive collection of information about shipwrecks in Lake Michigan from 1800 down to the present day. Meticulously researched and deftly written, organized and presented with an eye for accuracy, Shipwrecks of Lake Michigan is as engaging, informative, and highly recommended for personal, professional, and community library Maritime History collections and reading lists. ... Read more

Product Description
Dragan and his lover Marek are taking one last shot at love.Taking a Cruise through the Greek Ioanian Islands in an effort to revive their once hot relationship, Marek is deeply hurt by Marek’s recent online infidelity. He isn’t sure he even wants to be with Marek anymore, let alone be stuck on a boat in the middle of nowhere. Just as he starts to relax and enjoy the timeless beauty of the island of Zakynthos and Marek begins to convince him of his remorse, the two men are abducted by p ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Shipwreck Bay
Marek broke a cardinal rule and betrayed his lover's trust. Wanting to make it up to him, Marek arranges for a romantic trip for him and Dragan.Visiting the beautiful Greek Islands, Dragan tries hard to not snipe and ruin the trip. He knows he still loves Marek, but forgiving him his indiscretions is proving to be difficult.Knowing it would kill him to lose Dragan, Marek makes one last ditch effort to try to put things right between him and Dragan again.

Shipwreck Bay is smokin' hot!A sexy black Irish, a Greek god, and gorgeous pirates make quite a stimulating read.Marek has a lot of apologizing to do and flowers are not going to cut it.His actions caused Dragan to doubt himself and his appeal to be enough for his lover.Marek puts it all on the line to give Dragan reason to believe in them and himself again.Shipwreck Bay is a very erotic story and although Marek's methods of apologizing to Dragan are a bit unconventional, how much he loves and needs Dragan is very obvious.


Ley
Reviewed for Joyfully Reviewed ... Read more

Product Description
Shipwreck of the Whaleship Essex is the gripping story of a ship's encounter with a great white whale and the crew's harrowing plight for survival on the open seas. On 20 November 1820 the Essex was rammed by a sperm whale and sank in mid-Pacific. This book contains first mate's Owen Chase's original 1821 narrative, as well as two others written by the captain and a shipmate of the Essex. Each tells of the whale's attack, the sinking of the ship, and the three dreadful months that followed as the remainder of the crew were left stranded in a few small open boats in the South Seas. Of the twenty men that escaped the ship, eight survived; and they did so only by resorting to cannibalism.Capturing all the elements of an ancient and powerful tragedy, this book is a thrilling tale of survival - as well as a frightful example of man's darkest impulses - which allows the reader a gruesome glimpse behind the theatrical veil of honour and bravery that history often ascribes to such men of the sea. 'The reading of this wondrous story had a surprising effect upon me,' wrote Herman Melville on reading Owen Chase's narrative.An age-old gem of maritime lore, this story has made its mark as an inspiration for Moby Dick, one of the most legendary novels ever written. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Incredible .. all because of the real Moby Dick!
This is an incredible real story of survival. Who can ever would have thought that a huge whale will struck the wooden ship with such ferocity, twice. Here you will learn what really thirst and hunger is, and what are the effects of that in the body in a prolonged situation. Three months they were in the sea, because of a bad decision of heading south to the coast of Chile instead of moving with the currents to the nearby Tahiti or other islands of the mid pacific. This book has the account of Chase, the captain and one of the shipmates that were left in Henderson Island (Google Earth: 24°20'43S & 128°18'01W). The few boat survivors were taken to Valparaiso (Chile) for recuperation before going back home. This is a great book and a story that you can also read in Nathaniel Philbrick's, In the Heart of the Sea, a book I read a few years ago. Enjoy! ... Read more

Product Description
No other natural environment can match the danger of a hostile sea. This remarkable new collection brings together over 60 eyewitness accounts of tragedy, error and survival on the high seas. It includes such modern-day incidents as the high-ocean dismasting of Kingfisher 2, Richard van Pham’s 100 days adrift in 2002, the Kursk submarine disaster and the Exxon Valdez, as well as both legendary and lesser-known historical events like the HMS Proserpine catastrophe, the wreck of the Medusa, and the spectacular hurricanes that have buffeted the Caribbean island of Montserrat. The Mammoth Book of Storms, Shipwrecks and Sea Disasters offers white-knuckle accounts of disaster and endurance, evoking the addictive drama of The Perfect Storm. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Not worth buying
Not that good of a book. Too vague and uninformative. Not what I was looking for.

Not Bad -- But Not Original
Being fond of true stories about the sea, shipwrecks, and that kind of thing, I recently purchased this book after looking at some others on Amazon.I ordered it because I saw that an earlier reviewer scored it with five stars.But, after reading it, I think that it only merits about a three star rating -- in other words, it's okay.Not bad, but five stars?No way!In my opinion, there are much better, more intriguing "reads" on this subject.

It didn't take me very long to get through this book, despite its apparent length.While some of the material was new to me, relatively large portions of it (for me personally, about a quarter of the entire book or more) are comprised of extended extracts from other things I have previously read, such as "Titanic Survivor, The Memoirs of Violet Jessop, Stewardess", or "Owen Chase's Narrative", about how an angry whale charged and sank the whaleship Essex (a true story which was a major inspiration for Melville's Moby Dick).If I hadn't have already seen and read so much of the material in this collection -- if it was mostly new to me and "original" -- I might have ranked it a little higher.

Now, I don't want to jump to any hasty, ill-informed conclusions, but, as it is, I feel like this book might be yet another example (though certainly not one of the worst or most blatant) of an insideous little money-making trend that I've noticed in book publishing in recent years:a publisher contracts some "pro" to be an "editor"; the publisher's staff helps them hastily collect a bunch of topical material that has already been published elsewhere (it's even better if relevant material can be found which is relatively inexpensive to acquire and use, especially if copyrights have expired and one does not have to "shell out" for royalties and the like); the "editor" patches the miscellaneous material together, perhaps adding a quick few notes here and there; somebody cooks up a title; somebody else throws together some splashy cover art; and, then the end product is released and marketed as if it is something "new".It seems like a "rip-off" to me.Buyer beware -- check over things carefully before you make a purchase, and try to go for "originals", not "knock-offs"!

Storms, Shipwrecks and Sea Disasters
Beautiful book, perfect condition, and extremely informative! This book is outstanding for the seafarer, the ocean lover, and anyone interested in true accounts of what really happened at sea. Thanks for the great adventures! ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Looks like it was written by a second-grader
Absolutely amazing!I just got this book in the mail today.I opened at random to Chapter Two, and the first sentence I read is:

"Do captain's really go down with their ships, . . .?"

How about that!I can't read two words of a Frederick Stonehouse book without coming across an ignorant mistake involving punctuation!You don't use an apostrophe to pluralize a noun!A second-grader should know that!And this is typical for Stonehouse.He has some great material, but if he wants to be a writer he needs to get out of his scuba gear for awhile and learn some basic writing skills.He obviously doesn't know such things as how to use an apostrophe, when to use a comma, how to indicate footnotes, and an array of other writing basics.And if he's too arrogant to learn, he needs to find a publisher other than Avery Color Studios, maybe a publisher that actually knows how to edit a book.I was born and raised in Michigan and am proud of my native state, but when I see an Avery book with the motto "Proudly Printed in Michigan U.S.A." and containing such ignorant-looking editing, I want to go hide my head in the sand.

Recounting Perilous Voyages on the Great Lakes!
Maritime historian Frederick Stonehouse recounts the final voyages of eight Great Lakes ships in this volume from Avery Color Studios, a firm specializing in Great Lakes-related books, posters, maps, etc.

The ill-fated vessels chosen for inclusion share only the common trait of being steel-hulled ships whose loss tickled the author's fancy. They include a car ferry lost in 1910, a Netherlands freighter lost in 1953, a sand dredger lost in 1950 and so on. In most cases the ships succumbed to the terrifying storms that all too often sweep across the Great Lakes; the others collided in poor visibility.

Yet in reading through these accounts, time and again human stupidity, incompetence, inadequate crew training, poorly done ship inspections and related factors played roles in the sinkings and/or excessive loss of life. Stonehouse does a good job of evoking the tedium, tension and sometimes stark terror of sailing the Great Lakes and enduring its vicious storms.

Though none of these vessels will ever enjoy the notoriety of the EDMUND FITZGERALD, their voyages and endings are well told in this book, which includes over 80 black & white photographs and maps.

****

Two style points. Throughout the book, Stonehouse uses "it's" when he should be using "its." Likewise, footnotes are designated by Arabic numbers not Roman numerals.
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Product Description
Shipwrecks are an important complement to the natural coral reefs as a sport diving attraction in Florida. From the barley discernable ballast piles of the 1733 fleet to the almost perfectly intact modern ships sunk specifically as artifical reefs throughout the state, shipwrecks inspire an aura of mystery and facination. Florida Shipwrecks is the moat comprehensive, accurate, illustrated collection of information, photographs, sketches and stories ever written about the shipwrecks around the state of Florida. This book conatins a wealth of enlightening information that gives the readers a nostalgic glimpse into the history and present condition of over 235 shipwrecks. Florida Shipwrecks includes over 240 illustrations comprised of 151 color photos, 83 black and white historical images, 8 dynamic u/w sketches. Divers , snorlelers, marine historiean, armchair sailore or anyone with a general interest in history diving or the sea will surely find this book fascinati!ng, as well as indispensable ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

A good beginners giude
This book by two accomplished divers attempts the daunting task of guiding us through the myriad of Florida wrecks. The book is broken down by city or location and gives a history and a nice preview of the dive for each wreck.What is really great are the color photos, both above water and underwatershots. The only draw back to this book is the lack of exact wrecklocations. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

The "bible" of Straits diving
I wouldn't think of diving in the Straits of Mackinac without taking this book along. It makes a great read by the fireplace too, but it's an even better reference guide to keep on the dive boat. Chuck & Geri Feltner are the recognized experts on the shipwrecks of the Straits area and this book is a must for any serious Great Lakes wreck diver.

A Landmark Book of its kind
Shipwrecks of the Straits of Mackinac set a new standard for authors wishing to create regional directories of shipwrecks.I own nearly 500 books on the topic of Great Lakes shipwrecks and diving, and this one is by far the best written and best researched.The authors personally discovered many of the shipwrecks in and around the Straits of Mackinac but were also accomplished researchers and writers.This background enabled them to create a groundbreaking book that has yet to be equaled by others of its kind.Shipwrecks of the Straits of Mackinac gives remarkably detailed accounts of the wrecks in the area drawn from primary archival sources. The authors have also included many fascinating side stories and bits of local history to tie the wreck incidents together and to show their place in the larger arena of Great Lakes commerce and history.Exceptional dive information is included along with many underwater photos and site maps.Both discovered and undiscovered wrecks are detailed and presented in a very accessible table format.Even the bibliography of the book is fascinating due the many obscure and interesting references the authors were able to dig up.If you own only one book on Great Lakes shipwrecks, this should be the one. ... Read more

Product Description
This activity-packed journal of a diver's quest for hidden treasure follows Duncan Cameron deep under the sea as he searches for mysterious lost gold. The story unfolds as Duncan dives through a series of shipwrecks, recording every possible clue to the riddle that will guide him to the riches. Readers solve the mystery right alongside our hero, as Shipwreck Detective challenges them to discover both the fact and the fiction of all that lurks beneath the sea. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (4)

Magnificent!
To me the biggest mystery of all is how a book this wonderful and detailed ever got published.It's so lovingly filled with elaborate artwork and detachable items like photos, letters, and the compass, that I'm amazed it got approved. The mystery/story is entertaining for kids up to at least mid-high school, and it almost tricks the reader into learning a lot about diving and undersea archaeology.One of those sadly rare gems that sticks with you long after you've finished it.I cannot recommend it highly enough!

Fun and Educational
I bought Shipwreck Detective for my 11 year old daughter.She thoroughly enjoyed the images in the book and the storyline that included a mystery to solve.She loved pouring over the pages, the envelopes with clues and the diary entries.Adding characters to the storyline helped keep her interest as she poured over the material, all of which was presented in a very engaging way.Now that she's solved the mystery (she used the additiional clues on the website to do so), I'm wondering how often she'll look at the book.My guess is she'll pull it out when friends come over and help them figure out the mystery.

Lots of fun with a child
Your favorite uncle has died, and written a will describing a mystery treasure. Your job is to figure out where the treasure is located based on the clues in the book. This book is written journal-style, with lots of flaps, letters in envelopes, and other pieces to explore. There's a compass built into the front cover.

Read this book with a child. Learn about scuba and wreck diving, history and archaeology. Solve a mystery. This is wonderful, educational fun for a smart 8 year old, or a typical 10+ year old. Do it together, you'll both benefit.

"You'll find the treasure below the Sail, under the Compass, and beneath the Keel"
The conceit behind "Duncan Cameron's Shipwreck Detective" is that professional diver Duncan Cameron discovers a mysterious note in his Uncle Joe's sea trunk: "A small fortune in gold could be yours--if you are smart enough to find it.I'm leaving a list of shipwrecks and a riddle--the rest is up to you."Young readers get to join Duncan as he searches for clues to the location of the treasure around the world at some of the most famous shipwrecks in history, from the Antikythera wreck of a Roman Corbita that sank 70-80 BCE and the HMS "Edinburgh," torpedoes by her own crew to avoid capture during World War II (the shipwrecks are real, but the facts been adapted in some cases to accommodate the storyline).Inside the journal you find a compass, charts, flaps, your own personal dive log, an old fashioned map of the world, and much more.That is the reason this book comes with an elastic strap to keep it shut when you are not working through everything, otherwise the photographs, post-it notes, and other goodies could end up on the floor (do not worry; everything that is important is duplicated underneath the removable goodies so you cannot ruin the experience when somebody else loses things for you).

Basically you look over Duncan's shoulder while he and Helle investigate the shipwrecks and work out the clues to find the treasure.That search is the narrative thread for this engaging book illustrated by Cameron with text by Richard Platt, but that serves as a context for telling young readers all about what professional divers do when they check out shipwrecks.We get to learn about the symbols and abbreviations used on Admiralty charts, a swimming robot named "Nemo," star gazing, compass deviations, sailor's knots, and the tropical fish of the Coral Sea & Great Barrier Reef.The text is printed like it is handwritten and is accompanied by photographs, drawings, and various charts and diagrams.If you are familiar with publications from DK then you will not be surprised at how "Shipwreck Detective" has wall-to-wall illustrations on each two-page spread, although the balance is more towards the drawings by Cameron than the photographs of museum treasures we usually find in their books.

Those of you who want to skip ahead to the end of the book to find out the solution to the mystery and the location of the treasure will be bitterly, but appropriately, disappointed, because the answer is not there.Duncan succeeds and there is a giant clue when you get to the end, but to find out if you were right you have to go check out a special DK website for the book (I was actually reminded of the end of "The Da Vinci Code," which would be another clue that will be lost on most readers).The front cover is thick enough to include the a compass, but it also helps make the book something of a writing table when it is open, so this books is especially suited for long car trips.Cameron and Platt have come up with something that stacks up pretty well against computer games, especially in the education department.Plus Platt obviously tries to make this as much of a hands on experience as he can, short of having the readers get into a wet suit and start making dives out in the real world.So even once the mystery is solved (or you give up the hunt), you can still enjoy reading about the life of professional divers. ... Read more

Product Description
Fascinating, never-before-documented stories of the worst shipwrecks on the Pacific Coast during the golden age of coastal transportation, 1854 to 1929

In this intriguing chronicle, author Robert Belyk closely examines ten significant maritime disasters that occurred during one of the most turbulent eras in the history of travel. Discover the real-life drama endured by those caught in the terrifying midst of disaster at sea——and the real causes behind the tragedies. Vividly re-created and painstakingly researched, the shipwrecks accounted for here include:

• 1854: the Yankee Blade runs aground off Point Arguello, California.Twenty-eight passengers lose their lives.
• 1875: The old side-wheeler Pacific rams another passenger ship off the coast of Cape Flattery, Washington. Two hundred and seventy-seven people perish when her rotting hull gives way.
• 1906: The Valencia strikes a reef off the Washington coastline. Before dozens of dazed onlookers on the shore, the ship goes down, taking 117 passengers and crew with her.

Customer Reviews (3)

Unto the dread sea
Shipwreck narratives have a long, glorious history in English and American literatures. Cultures that take to the sea understand implicitly its sudden, inscrutable danger and its lure. It is not a far leap at all from Ulysses' travels on the wine-dark seas of the Mediterranean to the mundane coastwise sea transport that linked the thousands of miles of seaboard along the west coast of the United States and Canada in an era before interstate highways and commercial air travel.

Robert Belyk has rescued the important marine history of that place and time with this book. Each account of the various marine disasters covered here is well-researched and well-written. His straightforward, journalistic style makes for compelling reading. Of particular note is his account of the loss of the Princess Sophia in late October, 1918, with all hands after the ship grounded itself on the Vanderbilt Ledge in the dangerous Lynn Canal south of Juneau, Alaska. The Princess Sophia lingered, stranded on the rock outcropping, for over a day before an early winter storm floated her off her perch, allowing her to sink in a few moments with 343 people trapped aboard.

There is still a great deal of mythic power to stories of men and women struggling to survive the raging sea. The blockbuster status of movies such as "Titanic" and "The Perfect Storm" is proof of that power. You'll also find it in this solemn collection of ship sinkings along the Pacific Coast.

Shipwrecks come alive
This is a vivid and detailed account of ten maritime disasters on the west coast, in the great age of coastal shipping. Thoroughly researched and fully convincing. The eyewitness accounts and Belyk's clear style bring the reader along for the voyage, so to speak. While I often goggle at ship and seagoing technicalities, Belyk explains the important details, easing the reader into the narrative. The human struggle, motivation, greed to courage, also shine through, rare in historical writing. Highly recommended reading.

Good Book for Nautical Disaster Buffs
"Great Shipwrecks of the Pacific Coast," contains the stories of 10 deadly maritime disasters that all occurred between the 1850s and the 1920s.It does not attempt to be a comprehensive list of such disasters.As such, it is a cut above the usual for these kind of books.Author Robert Belyk is a historian, and though his prose it a bit dry at times, he delivers the goods with first hand accounts from the survivors and overall descriptions of the disasters.He also includes a little background of each story as well as the aftermath.This book will be much appreciated by anyone who enjoys a good maritime disaster tale. ... Read more

Product Description

The vast hidden world of sunken treasure.

With less than 2% of the world's ocean depths explored to date, a myriad of unimagined mysteries and treasures await discovery. Treasure Lost at Sea chronicles the excitement of underwater archaeology and search for treasure. The book recounts the major periods and geographic locations of shipwrecks.

Chapters include:

• The classical world
• Scandinavian shipwrecks
• The age of discovery
• The Spanish galleons
• Bermuda, graveyard of ships
• Privateers, pirates and mutineers
• Deep-water shipwrecks (Bismarck, Titanic, and others)
• Port Royal: The sunken city

The lively text details the potential treasure as well as the political turf wars, technological limitations, and forces of nature that threaten any mission's success.

Humanity's long history of exploration, civilization, trade and war is littered with sunken vessels. Colorful and richly illustrated, Treasure Lost at Sea will inspire a new generation of underwater archaeologists.

Customer Reviews (3)

Well done overview of history from the first ship wreck...
4200 years ago by Greece - just after or around the Great Flood.

Fascinating about the Romans going to Brazil.

Nice pictures
Coffee-table book of shipwrecks makes no attempt to be systematic, but is well-enough done, with some nice pictures.Ultimately just an OK throwaway.

A well-written, wide-ranging book
This is a well-written book which ranges in presentation of shipwrecks and their treasures from ancient wrecks to a few 20th century ships (Titanic, Bismark). Lots of adventure and tales of the search for treasure ships without getting bogged down in minutae. The ships range through time since man began plying the seas and across the world. I really enjoyed reading this book and highly recommend it to you. The only reason I didn't give it 5 stars is because I would have liked MORE pictures. It is loaded with pictures, but there was plenty of space to include more! ... Read more

Product Description
Readers' hearts have long thrilled to gripping tales of golden galleons, tossed by gales and engaged in bloody battle, as heroes triumph and cowards are vanquished in frantic search for treasure. Incredibly, such fantastic stories are now eclipsed by the phenomenal true saga of Shipwreck.

In 1654, Padre Diego Rivadeneira watched the immense Spanish galleon Capitana, "Queen of the South Seas," as she sank off Ecuador carrying treasures worth 10 million pesos. Later he was among 45 survivors when the 900-ton Maravillas sank on the wild shoals of Los Mimbres, Bahamas, burying 600 people as well as 5 million pesos in silver and gold.

Three hundred years later, diver and maritime historian Dave Horner discovered Padre Diego's diary in the Archivo General de Indias, Seville. Twenty-five years of subsequent research led to the discovery and salvage of the Capitana, as well as a diving expedition on the Maravillas shipwreck site. Moreover, Horner has painstakingly forged an authentic historical context for the padre's singular story. The result is an unparalleled account of real-life adventure on the high seas, and a stirring portrait of the riches that drove men across uncharted oceans to a new world, as men are still yet driven in search of treasures long lost at the bottom of the sea. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (6)

Truly a surprise
I got this book because of my interest in stories about people surviving shipwrecks. The Padre, the subject of the book, survived THREE shipwrecks -- that alone makes the book worth reading.But the book is about a lot more than that.
Through it I learned about the beginnings of the world economy, monetary systems and even the development of Western political/ governing systems. All of that is provided as background to why things happened as they did during this remarkable saga. But even without that breadth of view, the story is astonishing and gripping. The primary source for the story is the diaries of the Padre and the author does such a great job, I really felt like I was reading a book BY the Padre.
I read the book a couple years ago and have read others because of the interests it ignited. But nothing has come close to being as interesting, as gripping or as broad in world view.Even after three or four years, it's still vivid and I actively recommend it to friends. To me, it is an unheralded masterpiece.

Lots of Escudos.
Fabulous book in its research and real life adventures. Amazing that some of these places where various events took place, I've actually been there, 450 years later. Awesome.P. Almeidinha

The unluckiest Padre ever?
Immaculate research and superb translations from Spanish archive material turn this into both a scholarly research vehicle and a concise history of the Spanish colonies and the Treasure Fleets.
A good part of the narrative is in the words of a Spanish Padre sent out to Chile to minister to the colonists; this tells us first-hand of the vast mountains of silver that were being exported from South America, and of the nepotism, greed, dishonesty and cowardice that seems to be the product of any get-rich-quick scheme - and Spain had more than its fair share in the 16th & 17th Centuries. The rest of the story is supported byquotes from sailors and court officials, while Mr.Horner fleshes out the story with historical facts and some surmise - the many notes are detailed as appendix and are not intrusive, while there is other useful information contained in other appendices.

Our Padre seems unusually unlucky in being shipwrecked twice, and on the way home the fleet is ambushed in sight of Cadiz and he, along with two ships and 4 million pesos (38 cartloads!) are captured in a brilliantly described battle that Hornblower would be proud of.

However, he lives to tell the tale; his memoirs are so detailed that we have a better idea of the actual wealth contained in the treasure fleet than the manifests admit - also the position of the wrecks is so well decribed that Mr.Horner was able to locate the sites and recover valuable artifacts (and of course, silver).

As a bonus, we are treated to a superb description of the daringly successful 1657 British attack on the treasure fleet holed-up in Santa Cruz, in which the whole Spanish fleet was destroyed, with the loss of no ships and only 60 men on the British side. This effectively crippled Spanish hopes of sea-rule and bankrupted Seville.

The final chapter warns us of the perils of dealing with the red-tape and gung-ho journalism that inevitably accompanies any salvage, not to mention the thievery when there is treasure involved.

A very worthwhile read. ****

Shipwreck: A Saga of Sea Tragedy and Sunken Treasure
Mr Horner does a good job of describing the attempts of a Spanish monk to get back to his homeland and the ememy attacks that he is forced to endure on his voyage.The descriptions that he gives of his modern day salvage adventures is also very interesting.A good read.

A well researched and historically informative work
Set in Virginia, Florida, Ecuador and the Bahamas, there are no clear winners in this story, and Horner aptly entitles one of his chapters "Treasure isTrouble", something befitting the 17th-century Spaniards who met atragic fate on the waters of Ecuador and the Bahamas, as well as themodern-day treasure hunters whose greed has brought them nothing but"trouble". The exception remains Dave Horner whose goal wasclearly the quest for historical truth and the dissemination of valuablehistorical and archaeological data, something he achieved with eloquence. Acaptivating book and a lesson to be learned... again ... Read more

Product Description
This elegant essay exemplifies Blumenberg's ideas about the ability of the historical study of metaphor to illuminate essential aspects of being human. Originally published in the same year as his monumental Work on Myth, Shipwreck with Spectator traces the evolution of the complex of metaphors related to the sea, to shipwreck, and to the role of the spectator in human culture from ancient Greece to modern times.The sea is one of humanity's oldest metaphors for life, and a sea journey, Blumenberg observes, has often stood for our journey through life. We all know the role that shipwrecks can play in this journey, and at some level we have all played witness to others' wrecks, standing in safety and knowing that there is nothing we can do to help, yet fixed comfortably or uncomfortably in our ambiguous role as spectator.Through Blumenberg's seemingly inexhaustible knowledge of letters, from ancient texts through nineteenth-century reminiscences and modern speeches, we see layer upon layer revealed in the meaning humans have given to these metaphors; and in this way we begin to understand what metaphors can do that more straightforward modes of expression cannot.This edition of Shipwreck with Spectator also includes "Prospect for a Theory of Nonconceptuality," an essay that recounts the evolution of Blumenberg's ideas about metaphorology in the years following his early manifesto "Paradigms for a Metaphorology." ... Read more