- Hardcover: 351 pages
- Publisher: William Heinemann Ltd; 1st edition edition (6 May 2004)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0434008893
- ISBN-13: 978-0434008896
- Product Dimensions: 23.6 x 15.2 x 4 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 544,441 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Review
There is something enigmatically romantic about the desert, and few are more romantic than the Sahara, the greatest and most impenetrable of all. Having been fortunate enough to survive the wreck of their ship, Commerce, the crew perhaps deserved a little luck. Instead in this moving, yet gripping book, Dean King, biographer of nautical great Patrick O'Brian, details the unbelievable trials and tribulations suffered in this most inhospitable of environments. This epic tale of human bonding, endurance, survival and defiance of all the odds is truly gripping in the same way as The Heart of the Sea or indeed the stories of Daniel Defoe and Captain Scott. For a tale of derring do mixing tragedy with bravery, King's new book takes some beating. (Kirkus UK)
Product Description
The western Sahara is a baking hot and desolate place, home only to nomads and their camels, and to locusts, snails and thorny scrub - and it has a barren and ever-changing coastline has baffled sailors for centuries. On 28 August 1815 the US brig Commerce was dashed against Cape Bojador and lost, although through bravery and quick thinking the ship's captain, James Riley, managed to lead all of his crew to safety. What followed was an extraordinary and desperate battle for survival in the face of human hostility, hunger, dehydration and despair, as the crew were captured, robbed and enslaved. Sometimes together, more often apart, the sailors were dragged or driven through the desert by their new owners, who neither spoke their language nor cared for their plight. Reduced to drinking urine (their own and the camels'), flayed by the sun, crippled by walking miles across burning stones and sand and losing over half of their body weights, some of them nevertheless held on to their sanity. And over time James Riley and Sidi Hamet, slave and captor, came to recognize in each other men worthy of respect and the ransom not only of Riley himself but also of a handful of his crew suddenly seemed possible. But Sidi Hamet had enemies of his own, and to reach safety the sailors and their saviour had to overcome not only the desert but also the greed and anger of those who would keep them in captivity.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A gripping tale of humanity - and its failings,
By
This review is from: Skeletons On The Zahara (Paperback)
This is a really fascinating story in the vein of all the best survival books. What differentiates it from most survival stories is its setting in the Sahara, not an icy waste, and the date it occurred - 1815.
The treatment of the shipwrecked sailors is nothing short of shocking by today's standards. They were treated as a commodity to be traded, and yet this is eerily similar to the treatment doled out to black africans by white slavers. In an uncomfortable table-turning, we come to appreciate some of the injustices doled out by humanity. The fact that some of the sailors survived is nothing short of miraculous, and fortitude of the ship's captain, Riley is the key to this. There is no doubt that those who escaped were extremely fortunate and this is what keeps this book gripping. The other fascinating element of the book is the attitude of the sailors to their captors. Some captors were better than others, and the blinkered viewpoint of sailors to start with was considerably broadened by their experiences, particularly the strength and commitment to some of the locals to freeing them. Read this book and enjoy - and be grateful you're not enslaved in the Sahara.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
staggering,
By masspecguy (uk) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Skeletons On The Zahara (Paperback)
Possibly one of the best non-fiction adventure books written.
Sadly it was spoilt for me as I saw the documentary on the Discovery Channel some time previously. But as survival stories go this really does take some beating. Having read "white gold" this really did bring the horrors of ship wrecked mariners tales home. Treated less than dogs, to be bought and sold like cattle and classed as less than sub human You won't put it down
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
the brig commerce,
By
This review is from: Skeletons on the Zahara (Hardcover)
This book is esentially a rewrite of Captain James Rileys 1817 book entitled "An Authentic Narative of the Loss of the American brig Commerce"
The Commerce set sail from Gibralter for the Cape Verde Islands in August 1815 but because of ill winds and fog it drifted off course and was wrecked on the west African coast. All 11 crew and the 1 passenger got ashore but the passenger waskilled by nomads. The crew sailed a damaged whaler further down the coast but on going ashore were captured and enslaved then suffered several months of cruelty, starvation and neglect. Eventuallt 5 including the captain were ransomed to the British Consul and 2 others survived later.4crew disappeared and were never heard of again. This is a gripping story of bravery and endurance.When the book was published in 1817 the captain became an American hero. A book to be recommended.
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