THE CRUISE OF THE BREADWINNER

by H.E. Bates ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 4, 1947

The author of Fair Stood the Wind for France with a slight story, again with a war setting -- a story of sea and air and sudden death. Bates has two vital characteristics,- compassion and awareness. Vivid but sparsely emotional story of tragedy aboard the Breadwinner, a little coastwise fishing boat on war patrol, a boat with no auxiliary engine, and with a skipper and a crew of two, Jimmy, pessimistic gunner, who longed for a chance to try his gun (and won it, at the moment of violent death); and Snowy, who wanted to know all there was to know about planes and to own binoculars (these two goals were met, in varied degree -- and with them, a consciousness of the cost in human terms). A plane is wrecked, a flier rescued, a German boy found and death comes from the air- all in space of few words and pages. Bates can write. His audience will want this little book. But the fact that it is again a war incident will cause hesitancy on the part of a public that does not want war books. More limited than earlier book.

Pub Date: March 4, 1947

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Little, Brown

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1947

Categories: FICTION