Review: A Journey Into the Unknown
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 03 22, 2014
Are action, adventure, lust, profits, sailing on the open seas in “olden times” attractive to you? Then you will LOVE this book which is a major look into human behavior, human avarice, human hubris, and characters you care  about—wish well, differ with, cheer on, be horrified by their self-serving ethnocentric views.The world of yesteryear is on some levels quite strange to us. We are accustomed to doing things quickly; to instant communication; to fast travel.The idea of a three, or six, month sea voyage, in constant danger of the ship being attacked by pirates, sunk in a big storm,  be split open by a whale perhaps seems inconceivable to us. Breathing in the stench of bilge water in your ship's cabin for the journey is noxious to our way of life, to our standards of civilization.And yet, and yet, these voyages were the way of things once upon a time and thousands of people endured them, left them, died during them. The stakes were high—big money, religious proselytizing.Why would passengers subject themselves to such modes of travel—to  reach destinations, to spread the word of God as they interpreted it to “heathen savages”, to make huge profits, to take up the “white man's burden” of bringing “civilization” to ancient cultures as their expense; to escape hard labor imprisonment at penal colonies.Imagine a world where natives of lands foreign to Europeans see large, masted ships come into their harbors. Some were welcoming, some were belligerent at being so invaded. Some were peaceful peoples; some were warlike with a vast interest in muskets to use against their opponent tribes.All were considered “fair game” to wheel and deal with; all were considered by most visitors and new settlers inferior beings to the whites who felt they were being gracious to bring advanced civilization and exploitation to them at will.Three characters from very different backgrounds are finding their way to Fiji.One is a sailor, captured from a sinking vessel, and held as a slave of a Northwestern tribe along the now coast of Washington state.One is a blacksmith, sent to a penal colony where 'cruel and unusual' treatment is the way of it simply because he stole from his boss who wouldn't pay him something of lesser value than the actual wages owed. Some “criminals”, starving or unwilling to let their children starve, sent there for years for the crime of stealing a loaf of bread.One is the daughter of a pastor whose desire for the tall handsome rigger on the ship muddles her mind, vexes her maturing body, challenges her  religious upbringing.When we are young we have no idea where life and its events will lead us.Certainly none of our three companions on this journey considered as youngsters a destination of Fiji. And that is one of the things that this book has to offer you—changes in people, growth, successes, failures, conviction, acceptance of challenges, slips into negative behavior—all three on distance paths, all three coming together on a land far, far away from all they had known before of the world, of themselves.Get to know these characters, they are unforgettable and have a huge adventure before them. Set sail with them, be searing hot, or viciously cold with them. Feel the doubt, the desire, the seasickness, the passions, the terrors, their entire upbringing and ask “Are they up to this incredible journey?” Once you get to know Susannah, Jack, and Nathan in this prequel you will just have to know where their journey led them and if they were up to it!Pull up a chair, put your feet up and get ready to sail the high seas and feel intensely every moment of the voyage! The Morcan writing team of father and son never lets you down! They will make you ask, truly ask, aside from the expediency of travel and communication of today, just how much the world has changed; just how much we are still committed to huge profits, people and the earth be damned; just how much we still think in terms of “the white man's burden”; and just how much do we still use women as if they were throwaway objects?Oh yes, and while you are there, do order Fiji which continues this amazing journey!Bon voyage.