In the Sargasso Sea by Thomas Allibone Janvier (दर्जा : ****)

This is a children's Novel written by Thomas Allibone Janvier in 1898. Recently this book is re-issued by Kessinger Publishing. I came across this book while browsing the awsome collection of Project Gutenberg. Its mysterious name compelled me to read this century old book. Its digital format helped me to carry it wherever I went and allowed me to read it in spare time. Yet due to slow reading pace, it took me very long time to complete it.

When I first saw its title "In the Sagasso Sea", I remembered my school days, when I had learned about the Sargasso Sea in the Atlantic Ocean. Also I am a great fan of the Bermuda Triangle mystery. Hence I decided to read this book. Its english is late nineteenth century type a little bit hard to grasp, yet I had no trouble understanding the book. The book was simple and straight forward. It was a little monotonous since once the main character gets lost in the tangle of Sargasso Sea his life becomes really monotonous with very little things to do but to survive and get rescued. ninety percent of book depicts his struggle to survive in Sargasso Sea with a few interesting suspence twists like when he meet some living people onboard some boats trapped in the never ending tangle of the Sargasso Sea.

The protagonist, Roger Stetworth, unwillingly joins a slave ship called the "Golden Hind" captained by Luke Chilton. (When Chilton demanded that Roger "sign aboard" he refused and was clubbed on the head and thrown overboard.) He is rescued by the "Hurst Castle" and doctored by a painfully stereotyped Irishman. The "Hurst Castle" is abandoned but does not founder in a gale and the crew accidentally leave Stetworth marooned aboard. The ship drifts into the center of the Sargasso Sea where Stetworth finds himself in a ships' graveyard in which survivors of previous shipwrecks still inhabit the forgotten ships. Stetworth must rely on his own ingenuity to get free from the choking sargasso weeds. The end of the novel is quite plain when he gets out of the tangle and gets rescued. More dramatic climax could have been designed by a level headed author. But thus is what decided by the author a hundred years ago. Though the book is very old its story is still fresh and could be enjoyed by childrens as well as adults.

Overall the novel was good to read and informs the reader with the mystery of Sargasso Sea in the way as is understood at that time when ships and their navigation system was not as developed it is today. Even today with very developed shipping system and advanced satellite navigation we often hear about ships lost at sea due to storms or tidal waves or sometime due to no reason at all without a trace. Thats what we call Bermuda Triangle mystery.