In 1989, Nalepka and three companions capsized in a trimaran off New Zealand and spent a record 118 days adrift. Now, with the help of Callahan—who recorded his own sea-survival tale in Adrift (1985)—Nalepka renders a soulful, emotional account of his ordeal. Nalepka is a 38-year-old cook at Outward Bound in New Zealand when, lusting for adventure, he signs up with middle-aged playboy- skipper John Glennie to sail to Tonga along with Rick Heilregel, a young kayaker in remission from brain cancer, and Phil Hofman, only 42 but a veteran of open-heart surgery. Three days out of port, the boat capsizes in a storm, turning the next four months into a mini- Poseidon Adventure in which the ship floats upside down but the four men manage to survive, with minimal harm, on stored-away food plus rainwater they collect and fish and birds they snare. There are occasional trials of cold, hunger, and thirst but, with most of the ship submerged, the men's greatest challenge—and what raises this account above a routine endurance tale—is learning how to put up with one another in horribly tight quarters. Cramped physically and psychically, squabbling over bits of food and space, but also bonding to one another (the author grew particularly close to Rick), the men come to see that survival for each depends on the skills of all. Nalepka relates this growing revelation with passion but also in overheated prose (``Glennie is like a mad Boy Scout leader. Sometimes I wonder if he's even in the same solar system'') that only quiets down in the book's surpassingly moving conclusion, when, months after the ordeal, Nalepka tends Rick as his friend dies painfully of resurgent cancer. An earnest and engrossing, if overwritten, addition to the literature of survival, though not on a par with coauthor Callahan's tale. (Eight pages of b&w photographs—not seen.)
Pub Date: Oct. 21, 1992
ISBN: 0-06-017961-9
Page Count: 240
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1992
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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