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A review by maxsebastian
The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder by David Grann
adventurous
challenging
dark
informative
reflective
sad
slow-paced
4.25
After falling in love with The Liveship Traders earlier this year and enjoying a good Pirates of the Caribbean rewatch last Fall, I was excited to get to David Grann's new book, The Wager. Equal parts depressing and informative, Grann presents an incredibly compelling narrative in this story of "shipwreck, mutiny, and murder" that I found far more exciting than fictional tales of seafaring the British imperial age like Lord Jim.
Grann is a skilled storyteller. As becomes clear in the book, the trials of the Wager are a mired historical event. Instead of only retelling facts, Grann weaves a plot focused narrative structure with surprisingly detailed characters. This is obviously aided by closely kept logbooks, but, as Grann admits, many of the records of the Wager's crew were quite dry. By telling the story as it played out for the crew, Grann creates intrigue around elements of the ship's voyage before switching the scientific, historical, and political facts relevant to the events.
Throughout The Wager, Grann features a broad set of curious facts about maritime voyages in real recent history. Early in the book, I learned that British war vessels had literally hundreds of crew members and struggled with issues like the literal decay of the wood they were made of. Beyond the imperialists, the fate of this crew also leads Grann to explore the seafaring traditions of different native groups in Patagonia, which I found perhaps more fascinating. In this vein, it's worth noting that Grann's concluding remarks on colonialism in the British empire are thought provoking and relevant today.
While Grann takes time to set up his characters in the book's first section, it is worth noting that stuff takes off pretty quick. For the amount of research Grann clearly put into The Wager, he produced a novel with surprisingly little fat. While Grann tells you in broad strokes what will happen to the crew immediately in his introductory author's note, the narrative remains engaging throughout, which demonstrates that history does not require mystery to be exciting.
Grann is a skilled storyteller. As becomes clear in the book, the trials of the Wager are a mired historical event. Instead of only retelling facts, Grann weaves a plot focused narrative structure with surprisingly detailed characters. This is obviously aided by closely kept logbooks, but, as Grann admits, many of the records of the Wager's crew were quite dry. By telling the story as it played out for the crew, Grann creates intrigue around elements of the ship's voyage before switching the scientific, historical, and political facts relevant to the events.
Throughout The Wager, Grann features a broad set of curious facts about maritime voyages in real recent history. Early in the book, I learned that British war vessels had literally hundreds of crew members and struggled with issues like the literal decay of the wood they were made of. Beyond the imperialists, the fate of this crew also leads Grann to explore the seafaring traditions of different native groups in Patagonia, which I found perhaps more fascinating. In this vein, it's worth noting that Grann's concluding remarks on colonialism in the British empire are thought provoking and relevant today.
While Grann takes time to set up his characters in the book's first section, it is worth noting that stuff takes off pretty quick. For the amount of research Grann clearly put into The Wager, he produced a novel with surprisingly little fat. While Grann tells you in broad strokes what will happen to the crew immediately in his introductory author's note, the narrative remains engaging throughout, which demonstrates that history does not require mystery to be exciting.