Sunday, April 3, 2022

NetGalley ARCs | OF COURSE THERE ARE NEW TITANIC BOOKS COMING OUT IN APRIL!

             


I received both of these books from Pen and Sword via NetGalley in exchange for honest reviews.

I will never not be a sucker for a book about Titanic. This mindset has even infected my child (big surprise!) and she constantly laments how the school library makes her check out fiction books. She told me just the other day how many Titanic books they have that she wants to read, but can't because they only get one non-fiction at a time. Honestly, it's a really stupid rule. There is no danger of my child never reading. She has TONS of books at home, so many not read yet because of our never-ending love affair with the library where we find even more fiction and non-fiction treasures. Regulating a child's reading in this way is unacceptable.

But I digress.

Titanic Day by Day ⭐⭐⭐⭐

Titanic Day by Day is not a book to be read in a few sittings. It is as much a reference book about the great liner, her passengers, and crew, as anything else, given all of the exhaustively researched details it contains.

The author is the great grandson of Robert Hichens, one of Titanic's quartermasters who was at the helm of the great ship when she struck the iceberg. Hichens would survive the sinking by manning one of the lifeboats and I think this book is a wonderful tribute to not only him from his grandson, but a greater tribute to EVERYONE who lived and died that night.

This book is incredibly unique in that we are given a look at every single person who set foot on the ship during her maiden voyage. Starting on January first, the author lists events on that day related to every passenger and crew member - those who were born that day, and those who survived the sinking but died on that particular day later on. The author also includes news articles from the day, quotes from survivors, and an assortment of facts about the Ship of Dreams. As a result, we get quite a bit of information on both the American and British inquiries in the days following Carpathia's arrival in New York with the exhausted and traumatized survivors.

I truly appreciated that the author sought out information on everyone. So often we only hear about the first class passengers who lived and died, because that is the information most readily available. But second- and third-class passengers were no less important and deserve to have their stories told as well.

This book is nothing short of a labor of love and I would recommend it to anyone with an interest in learning a bit more about those who lived and died that awful night.

Why the Titanic was Doomed ⭐⭐⭐

Full discloser, it annoys me when people say 'the Titanic'. That was not her name. Her name was Titanic, so refer to her properly please and thank you.

There are so many factors at play for why Titanic sank, that solely blaming the iceberg that tore her open is a bit silly. Over the years so much information has been discovered and made public, that chances are you have heard about everything the author discusses (if you are obsessed like I am) even if all of that information has not been confined to one book/article/etc.

There are a myriad of reasons why Titanic sank and the author posits that she was doomed before she even left Southampton on April 10th, 1912. We know about the lack of lifeboats, the rivets and sub-standard metal, the lack of wind, the missing binoculars, the lack of true watertight bulkheads (since they did not actually go all the way up to the deck above), the ignored ice warnings, Captain Smith's decision to maintain speed, and so on.

What the author has done is taken every single issue, devoted a whole chapter to its discussion, and broken down piece by piece every part of the puzzle that lead to 1,500 senseless deaths. That is the core of what the book is about, and he does not spend time recounting the disaster itself minute by excruciating minute, because that has been done several times over already. He focuses on each issue that contributed to the sinking.

The author also looks at the reasons as to why some would live while so many others would die. Specifically of course, in third class, where the majority would not make it to the decks in time to get a seat in a lifeboat.

One issue that is not often discussed is the fact that Titanic should not have even set sail in April. The original date was March 20th. However, when Olympic collided with HMS Hawke in September of 1911, many resources being used to build Titanic were shifted to making repairs to Olympic, thus pushing back her launch date. Given the weather conditions, this is huge, because warmer weather of course meant that icebergs were drifting farther south at that point than they would have been in March.

Given all the positives I have discussed, you might be wondering why only three stars. I have thought about it a lot and my reasoning for this is that there was not any new information here. I liked reading the book, it was well-researched and each flaw was given its fair share of ink. But I do not consider it a 'new and unique' look at why Titanic sank.

Even so, I do believe this would be a good book for anyone interested in looking specifically at each failure that lead to Titanic's sinking. It is clear and concise, while still offering thorough explanations.

Recommended.

14 comments:

  1. Getting reviews for a first time author is a difficult process. I used usbookreviews.com to get 100+ reviews for my book at very affordable price. This helped to give a big boost to my book visibility and sales. I also got a complimentary spot in their email newsletter which also helped with sales. So, if you are looking for reviews, would definitely recommend.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I mean, I know this is a spam message since you post the same thing all the time, but it is kind of funny to see that you don't even pick your target audience well. I'm obviously not look for reviews and am WRITING them. Maybe do a bit better job in choosing the blogs you want to spam.

      Delete
  2. I'm *so* with you on the whole 'the' Titanic thing. But then I'm a notorious pedant for things like that [grin] I normally refer to her as RMS Titanic which usually makes the 'the' redundant. Both books look interesting for different reasons. The thing I really need to find out about though is the fact that two of the 3rd class passengers had my surname. One of the reasons I started tracing my family back is to find out if we're actually related. No luck yet but I'll *definitely* let you know if I find anything. The only thing against the link was that my paternal line is from the East coast of Ireland and the two women both originated on the West coast as far as I know but I've subsequently learnt that some of my fathers relatives also hailed from the West so who knows at this point!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. YES! I do the same thing, either call her RMS Titanic or Titanic. No 'the' necessary! It drives me absolutely bonkers. Whenever someone says Titanic, you know what they're talking about. No one describes anything as being titanic, the word is pretty much solely reserved for her at this point.

      I am so loving this journey of yours in uncovering your ancestors. I have a lot of materials on my family and just have to find the time to start digging, and stop being lazy about it. Did those passengers survive?

      Delete
    2. Well, they were Irish passengers in steerage - so, no. They both died that night. The percentage of survivors by Class has always really annoyed me but that was just another facet of Edwardian society I guess.

      Delete
    3. I kind of figured probably not, but I was hoping maybe.

      Delete
  3. titanic, i will be sure to get it right...i love that your daughter is so into reading, especially nonfiction. mr wonderful and i saw the moving titanic museum...or whatever you call it and it was really cool
    sherry @ fundinmental

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Lol, thank you! It has been a pet peeve of mine since forever and drives me bonkers! I really want to take Eleanor to see the big Titanic exhibits but I don't fancy taking my eight year old to Vegas quite yet, so...

      Delete
  4. Always a sucker for Titanic books. The first one sounds more interesting than the latter, though. Of course, Titanic's sister ships didn't a fare much better after the war broke out: in some alternate timeline where the Titanic didn't sink then, dollars to donuts it would have gone under during the war!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Oh for sure! And if she had not sunk in the first place, we would hardly know anything about her at all, you know? She would have been just another trans-Atlantic ship we hear about briefly from the era that had been pressed into service during WWI.

      Delete
  5. First off, why the heck will they not allow your daughter to take out more than one non fiction at a time? That's lame! They should change that! GRRRRRRRR.

    Now, onto the reviews. Both are great! Titanic Day by Day does sound like a labor of love and something I would love to own. I will be getting that one for sure!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Right??!! I don't get it. Like, let kids check out whatever they want. They are also limited to one graphic novel at a time. It seriously irritates me. As long as kids are reading, who cares if it is fiction, non-fiction, or a graphic novel. They're READING, which is the whole point.

      I hope you love it as much as I did, it did such a great job of honoring everyone, not just the big names we know.

      Delete
  6. Being an Indie author means you need to be a multi-tasker. I write my books and initially edited them also. I learnt to design decent covers and also some marketing basics. But, gathering reviews was very time consuming and draining. I was referred to https://usbookreviews.com by a friend and my life became easy. They help me with gathering reviews for my book and also a boost to my marketing efforts with their complimentary ebook promotion. I am slowly building an audience who likes to read my books and feel like I made the right decision becoming an Indie author.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You already posted a spammy message on this review about getting reviews. I will absolutely never read your books, if you're even a real person, because of your complete lack of awareness for your target audience.

      Delete

Thanks for visiting my little book nook. I love talking books so leave a comment and let's chat!