We, The Drowned - Hardcover

Jensen, Carsten

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1846550963 ISBN 13: 9781846550966

Publisher: Harvill Secker, 2010

Synopsis

An epic drama of adventure, courage, ruthlessness and passion by one of Scandinavia's most acclaimed storytellers.

In 1848 a motley crew of Danish sailors sets sail from the small island town of Marstal to fight the Germans. Not all of them return - and those who do will never be the same. Among them is the daredevil Laurids Madsen, who promptly escapes again into the anonymity of the high seas.

As soon as he is old enough, his son Albert sets off in search of his missing father on a voyage that will take him to the furthest reaches of the globe and into the clutches of the most nefarious company. Bearing a mysterious shrunken head, and plagued by premonitions of bloodshed, he returns to a town increasingly run by women - among them a widow intent on liberating all men from the tyranny of the sea.

From the barren rocks of Newfoundland to the lush plantations of Samoa, from the roughest bars in Tasmania, to the frozen coasts of northern Russia, We, The Drowned spans four generations, two world wars and a hundred years. Carsten Jensen conjures a wise, humorous, thrilling story of fathers and sons, of the women they love and leave behind, and of the sea's murderous promise. This is a novel destined to take its place among the greatest seafaring literature.

About this title

Review:

"A novel of immense authority and ambition and beauty, by a master storyteller at the height of his powers. This is a book to sail into, to explore, to get lost in, but it is also a book that brings the reader, dazzled by wonders, home to the heart from which great stories come. Meet Carsten Jensen half way and you're spellbound." (Joseph O'Connor)

"'Impressive... one of the more engrossing literary voyages of recent years... Rich, powerful and rewarding'" (Financial Times)

"Bleak, thrilling and colourful, Carsten Jensen's splendid seafaring epic brings vividly to life the adventures of generations of mariners from the small Danish town of Marstal...The community of living and dead characters offers compelling stories of war, death and adversity, but also triumph and the experience of marvels that have the quality of a legend." (Metro)

"We, The Drowned is first and foremost a novel about the sea, a novel which has practically been written in cooperation with the great authors of the nineteenth century - Conrad, Melville, Stevenson... We, The Drowned is the best novel I have read in ages." (Aftenposten, Norway)

"Manoeuvres easily between intimacy, subtlety and contagious pleasure in the greater narrative, the cock-and-bull story and the grotesque details... a counterpart to Gabriel García Márquez and One Hundred Years of Solitude." (Jyllands-Posten, Denmark)

From the Publisher:

`A novel of immense authority and ambition and beauty, by a master storyteller at the height of his powers.' Joseph O'Connor

'Carsten Jensen is...in my opinion, an utterly unique storyteller.' Henning Mankell

About this edition

• Publisher: Harvill Secker
• Publication date: 2010
• ISBN 10: 1846550963
• ISBN 13: 9781846550966
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 704