by Carol Blair.
This is one of the books shortlisted for the Booker this year. It was an amazing story about a young British boy whose life first changes when he is attacked by a tiger -- and gets offered a job with the man who acquires wild animals and sells them. Then, when the boy is a teenager he signs on a trip with a whaling ship which is also seeking to capture a dragon on an island in Indonesia (a Komodo dragon from the description).
The book provides a detailed description of whaling, capturing the whale and harvesting the oil and meat from the whale. They do indeed succeed in capturing a dragon but one of the sailors lets the dragon loose on the ship. To save themselves the sailor have to toss the dragon overboard. The sailor who let the dragon free is a bit crazy (seeing images, etc.) is conviced that the ship is cursed for capturing the dragon and the ship is then plagued by many storms until it capsizes.
The author then goes on to describe in brutal detail what it is like to be afloat on the ocean for weeks. Most of the crew die during the time at sea but the boy is one of two who survive. He has to learn to live with the shock of his experience and the despair of (killing)/losing his best friend and the other men who had come to be his friends and the guilt for having survived.
This book was a very powerful story, I found it much more engaging than other books with similar themes, e.g. Life of Pi. I don't think I will forget this book or the images of the tragedy at sea for a long time. The author did an excelllent job at portraying London for lower class people in the late 1800's. The language was very beautiful and lyrical... e.g. when the dragon is about to charge them the protagonist describes it "The grass sang".
One reviewer, Robert Hough, comments about the book "Never mind not being able to put it down... there is a 100-page section in which you will not be able to breathe." He does not exaggerate!
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