Best Titanic Fiction

[Mike Herbold]

I haven't read many of these books yet, but would be interested in what different reader's consider the best and worst fictional Titanic offering.
Kid's books, like "The Diary of Margaret Ann Brady" have been purposely left out, because that's another category itself.

"Every Man for Himself" by Beryl Bainbridge
"The Ghost from the Grand Banks" by Arthur C. Clarke
"Maiden Voyage" by Cynthia Bass
"The Memory of Eva Ryker" by Donald A. Stanwood
"Murder on the Titanic" by Jim Walker
"No Greater Love" by Danielle Steel
"Sherlock Holmes and the Titanic Tragedy" by William Seil
"Something's Alive on the Titanic" by Robert Serling
"Douglas Adam's Starship Titanic" by Terry Jones
"Titanic" by Robert Prechtl
"Titanic 2012" by Bill Walker
"Titanic, A Love Story" by Shannon OCork
"Voices from the Titanic" by Jim Walker

 

[Cátia Lamy]

Hi Mike!!

I've got "Every man for himself" by Beryl Brainbridge but I haven't start reading it yet because I'm still reading "The night lives on" (Walter Lord) and 'cause they're both in english I take some time reading so I can get everything in it. Anyway, if no one as read it yet I'll read it and tell you something later!

Bye,
Cátia Lamy

 

[Paul John Rogers]

Mike,

Sad person that I am, I would like to add to your list (and cast my vote for) "Raise The Titanic" by Clive Cussler. Sorry!

Or were you counting this one as a kid's book?

Regards,

Paul.

 

[Mike Poirier]

Hi Mike:
Good poll!
Bainbridge's book was one of the worst ( sorry Senan ). She had no clear cut theme going. Fictional characters appear and disappear through out the book and serve no particular purpose. Plenty of historical errors as well in this one.
Memory of Eva Ryker was excellent. Very vivid. Stanwood captures the Titanic in all her glory. Same with Peck's Amanda/Miranda.
If anyone that O'Cork wrote about were alive , she would have lawsuit on her hands. She slanders so many passengers and crew it isn't even funny.
I found Clarke's book extremly dull. I am still trying to figure out why he wrote it.
Serling and Walker both wrote very interesting Titanic books. I read them from cover to cover. Both worth buying. The Bass book is too preachy in
feminist movements and politics. By the time she got to Titanic, I could hardly believe she was descibing the same shipwreck. She obviously did minimal research. Walker actually steals Bainbridge's plot and makes it somewhat better. But still plagarism is plagarism.

 

[Mike Herbold]

Paul John Rogers:
Thanks for adding "Raise The Titanic." I had intended to put it on there and somehow forgot.
Michael Poirier:
Thanks for all the quick reviews. I wasn't sure where to go next, and now it looks like Eva Ryker is a good choice. You snuck in Peck's Amanda/Miranda on me -- I'm not familiar with that one; please tell me a little more. I read the Bass book in a couple of days and actually liked it, especially from the standpoint of the guilt that some passengers felt for being a survivor.

 

[Mike Herbold]

Paul John Rogers:
Thanks for adding "Raise The Titanic." I had intended to put it on the list and somehow forgot.
Michael Poirier:
Thanks for all the quick reviews. I wasn't sure where to go next, and now it looks like Eva Ryker is a good choice. You snuck in Peck's Amanda/Miranda on me -- I'm not familiar with that one; please tell me a little more. I read the Bass book in a couple of days and actually liked it, especially from the standpoint of the guilt that some passengers felt for being a survivor.

 

[Mike Poirier]

Amanda/Miranda is about manipulative Amanda Whitwell and her almost look alike maid Miranda Thorne. The section on the Titanic is excellent and frightfully vivid. Even Victorine Chaudanson gets a starring role! Also recommend The American Heiress by Dorothy Eden. Almost similar plot, but set on the Lusitania. It is equally good. If you want to talk about books- send me a private emails I can steer you in a couple of directions.
Mike

 

[Kritina Johnston]

I'm surprised no one brought up "Ghost From the Grand Banks". Okay, so I will!

I'd spent some time tracking it down, finally finding a copy in the library. The most memorable part of this book is the completely intact corpse of a young Irish girl that is found on the wreck, and the computer programmer tragedienne who is determined to find a way to reanimate the girl to replace her dead daughter. Unlikely this is, hmmph! But the epilogue is rather interesting, with an alien probe coming to Earth and finding no life or signs of technology, but it does pick up a strong signal of a metallic object. Out of all the things to survive mankind...

 

[Stacey Bradley]

I've read No Greater Love by Danielle Steele. The first 40 or so pages were on the Titanic and the sinking. For the most part the book dealt with the lives of the oldest daughter and brothers and sisters she had to raise after her mother, father, and fiancee perished. I didn't care for the book very much and don't recommend it unless you like love stories which this ends up being.

I also have Titanic: A Love Story but quit reading it when the book says that Captain Smith watches all the women boarding...and has a nasty remark with it. If I ever get around to trying to read it again, I'll post what it was about.

 

[Richard A. Krebes]

I read the Bainbridge book. Interesting that the main (fictonal) character is a nephew of J.P. Morgan. The real-life characters were decently done, IMHO, and the sinking was okay too. Though not factually flawless by any means.
I thought this book was good at first, but then it sunk in that it had the "same old, same old" First/Third class-only theme (not a word on Second class!), and the fictonal hokum was kinda soapy. In the end, all things considered, it wasn't "The Killer Angels"* by a long shot! Nor are the fictonal characters on a par with, say, the ones in Shelby Foote's novel "Shiloh". All being a tich goofy and silly in the hijinx that they do both on the madien voyage, and after the T. has had a meeting with a certain iceberg.

Richard K.

* No, no, this isn't a biker gang novel! It is a historical ficton novel by Micheal Sharra that uses ACTUAL PEOPLE from both the Army Of The Potomac, and the Army Of Northern Virgina, to re-tell the story of the battle of Gettysburg through their eyes as well as subtly use ficton to bring these folks to life as the HUMAN BEINGS that they were. It also gives us some "big picture" glimpses at what the war was about, too, via the characters. R.K.

 

[Sam Brannigan]

Ive read Titanic: A love story and can confirm that it is the most atrocious book you will ever read on the ship. Captain Smith is portrayed as a randy old sea dog who is out to get his leg over on his last voyage and is torn by the first class lover sprawled naked in his quarters and the "boring" Eleanor back home. He ends up drowning in her arms.The love scenes are seriously vomit inducing. The charming sub plot is of beautiful 1st class twins, one of whom gets off with jock hume and the other becomes secretly jealous. Everyones happy when the twin in lust breaks her back during the disaster and the jealous one gets to carry on her affair with the others blessing. To make it even more excruciating, apart from all the other c**p, Lightoller is referred to as "Chuck" the whole way through. Although the author says that she had to use artistic licence (fair enough)she really has plumbed the depths. Avoid at all costs.

 

[Rolf Vonk]

Hi Sam,

I COMPLETELY AGREE!!! I've read the book too, and I have to say that it is the most terrible and bad book I've ever read (And I'm a very well-read man). The story is just about affairs and unbelieveble collected nonsense. Like you said Captain Smith is thinking more about sex with older ladies than on his ship in this story! To make it a bit mysterious there is an old one-eyed gipsy who gives one of the first class ladies advice about her lover. Another first class women seems to be a black woman at the end of the story. She is pregnant and her husband is so confused about the fact she is black (he didn't know this before) that he manhandels her in a tipsy mood. Because of that she's having a spontaneous confinement at the time Titanic struck an iceberg! My god, what a misery. Looks like the bold and the beautiful.

Better take another book.
Greetings Rollie

 

[Sam Brannigan]

Hi Rollie
Oh yeah! I forgot about the bloody fortune teller in steerage. She did a Kate Winslet and jumped off the stern. Isnt EJ getting some hot lovin' while the ship nearly destroys the iceberg, it hits with such force!Its a shame everyone else in the book didnt jump with the gipsy woman!

Regards
Sam

 

[Rolf Vonk]

HI SAM!,

You understand the real bad meaning of the story too!! It's a kind of evil reincarnation of James Cameron's movie. It's EJ who hits with such force and not the iceberg! Does that mean that the whole story about the iceberg is untrue?????? We have new evidence about the disaster by Mrs (Miss??) Shannon O'cork. Were the people in Cameron's movie so sympathetic to jump together with Rose and Jack off the stern, the people in the book are oh so individual and they all give the wrong sample what to do in case of emergencies!! But is it sure that the gipsy women jumped off board? She was one-eyed so maybe she walked to the wrong side of the deck and fell from the stern!!

Greetings Rollie

 

[Sam Brannigan]

Hi Rollie!
Ever heard the phrase "if it hadnt happened they could never have made it up"?
This is the story of the Titanic if the disaster had never happened!

Regards
Sam