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A review by lkedzie
Sinkable: Obsession, the Deep Sea, and the Shipwreck of the Titanic by Daniel Stone
5.0
It's like that XKCD about majoring in everything, except with a minor in monomaniacism.
If not written in as charming a manner, this might be a frustrating book with its wandering catholic interest and focus that can be about anything from natural history to legal minutia. But it is well done, presenting a sort of intellectual joyride where the surprise of what is coming up next is part of the fun.
It is about the Titanic, but it begins where most stories end. And even then it is somewhat light on the details of the ship's demise, at least in comparison to some of its discourse. It is centered on the people who have been fixated on it, on finding it or doing something to it.
In specific, I think that it sticks the landing here in a way that a lot of similar books (Why Fish Don't Exist leaps to mind) of extrapolating its biographical subjects to say something more about the human condition in general. And I think that a lot of that rises out of the glee that Stone seems to treat the members of the extended shipwreck community (noting that a lot of the people here are wholly outside of it). I feel like some of the more minor interviewees stick with me as much as the bigger ones, and it feels like it rises out of that love for people and how interesting they are, and the technique to get that to shine through.
My only complaint is somewhat meta in the sense that the choice to do this, while lots of fun, does make it so that I suspect a lot of people who come to the book looking for only one thing will walk away disappointed, so I do sort of wonder what a book that was more focused and would be like. But I still really like this tale of all the different characters in cheerful obsession over a sunken ship.
If not written in as charming a manner, this might be a frustrating book with its wandering catholic interest and focus that can be about anything from natural history to legal minutia. But it is well done, presenting a sort of intellectual joyride where the surprise of what is coming up next is part of the fun.
It is about the Titanic, but it begins where most stories end. And even then it is somewhat light on the details of the ship's demise, at least in comparison to some of its discourse. It is centered on the people who have been fixated on it, on finding it or doing something to it.
In specific, I think that it sticks the landing here in a way that a lot of similar books (Why Fish Don't Exist leaps to mind) of extrapolating its biographical subjects to say something more about the human condition in general. And I think that a lot of that rises out of the glee that Stone seems to treat the members of the extended shipwreck community (noting that a lot of the people here are wholly outside of it). I feel like some of the more minor interviewees stick with me as much as the bigger ones, and it feels like it rises out of that love for people and how interesting they are, and the technique to get that to shine through.
My only complaint is somewhat meta in the sense that the choice to do this, while lots of fun, does make it so that I suspect a lot of people who come to the book looking for only one thing will walk away disappointed, so I do sort of wonder what a book that was more focused and would be like. But I still really like this tale of all the different characters in cheerful obsession over a sunken ship.