A Night to Remember by Walter Lord Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of A Night to Remember
Book Review: STAR Book Project
Summary: 3 Stars
Major Conflict
The biggest conflict in the book was that the Titanic was considered unsinkable by "Shipbuilder Magazine" and many other people and sources. One of the officers even said "Even God himself could not sink this ship." So everybody was positive that the boat could not sink, because of this they were unprepared if the ship did sink. One example of them not being prepared is the lifeboats. There were sixteen life boats on the Titanic, all together the life boats could hold 1,178 people, on that Sunday night there were 2,207 people onboard the Titanic.
Character Comparison
Tobias McIvey(from Land Remembered) and Captain Smith could help each other. One way is Captain Smith has a boat so Tobias could ride up the Kissimmee River to trade. Captain Smith thinks everything will be ok, like Tobias, but Captain Smith knows when something is not right or when he shouldn't do something. I think these two people would get along because Tobias is a very nice person and I think the relationship between them would be a lot like Tobias and Skillet's (former slave from Land Remembered) relationship.
Jacket Blurb
The author did fantastic job on writing this book. He had referred to sources like magazines that had considered the ship unsinkable and he had many quotes from the crew and passengers aboard the ship. One of my favorites is when someone asked if the ship was really unsinkable one of the crew members said "Even God himself could not sink this ship". He also told the reader just about everything that happened even down to when they shot the flares up and how many lifeboats there were and how many people they could hold. Another thing the author put in the book was a labeled map and timeline of the ship. This was very helpful because he talks about certain thing that happen in specific rooms so it helps you see exactly what flooded first and when they flooded.
Recommendation
Would I recommend this book to others? Yes and no. Yes because it is extremely vivid. No because I found it hard to get interested in the book. I think one of the problems for me was that it seemed like more of a list. A list of like what people wore and what people did. Almost as if it was too vivid or had too much description. Someone who would like this book is someone who likes history or someone who enjoys reading about history.
Theme Application
One theme of this book is that the crew did not prepare the boat for the correct amount of people going on the Titanic's maiden voyage. One example of this is that they only brought enough life boats for 1,178 people. Considering that there were 2,207 people on the Titanic's trip. There were obviously not enough life boats for all guests on the ship. One reason they did not bring enough life boats was because everybody insisted that the ship was unsinkable. Something I have learned from this situation is to always bring enough or more than needed. Also to never say never and always expect the unexpected.
Book Review: The undisputed champ after 52 years
Summary: 5 Stars
Two things set A Night to Remember apart from every other book and film on the subject of the Titanic:
First, with the exception of the ship breaking up as it sank (and the official record, with its conflicting testimony, shows it could have been written either way in 1955) and the use of the first SOS (which Lord corrected in later editions), there is not a single fact in the book that has ever been proven wrong. And, oh, how supporters of Capt. Lord of the Californian have tried.
Second, this is not a book about the sinking of the Titanic so much as it is a book about the PEOPLE involved in the event of the sinking. Take just the first sentence of the first chapter: "High in the crow's-nest of the new White Star Liner Titanic, Lookout Frederick Fleet peered into the dazzling night." Remember back to your English grammar classes and you will note that the subject of this sentence is a person, not a ship. So it is throughout the rest of the book. As readers, are we not more compelled by people rather than objects? Of course we are.
And as Walter Lord reminds us from the first that this is a story about people, so does he employ the expertise of a reporter and the flair of a novelist. The reporter . . . Who? Frederick Fleet. What? He peered. When? Night. Where? The Titanic's crow's-nest. Why? He was a Lookout. But by dressing up these facts with a few choice words and phrases ("High up", "new", "dazzling"), Lord draws us in dramatically.
Over the years, science and technology have given us greater insight into the building, operation, and physical break-up of the Titanic. But no one has ever come close to Walter Lord in recreating and relating the events of the night of April 14 - 15, 1912.