Stranded

A Novel

By: Bracken MacLeod

Narrated by: PJ Ochlan

Badly battered by an apocalyptic storm, the crew of the Arctic Promise find themselves in increasingly dire circumstances as they sail blindly into unfamiliar waters and an ominously thickening fog. Without functioning navigation or communication equipment, they are lost and completely alone. One by one the men fall prey to a mysterious illness. Deckhand Noah Cabot is the only person unaffected by the strange force plaguing the ship and her crew, which does little to ease their growing distrust of him.

Dismissing Noah's warnings of worsening conditions, the captain of the ship presses on until the sea freezes into ice and they can go no farther. When the men are ordered overboard in an attempt to break the ship free by hand, the fog clears, revealing a faint shape in the distance that may or may not be their destination. Noah leads the last of the able-bodied crew on a journey across the ice and into an uncertain future where they must fight for their lives against the elements, the ghosts of the past, and, ultimately, themselves.

©2016 Tom Doherty Associates LLC (P)2016 Macmillan Audio

Invest in this story!

Great plot, great characters, I found myself waiting in my car at the end of my day to hear more of this story.

Great idea but just couldn't develop it

It took awhile for the story to get going. When it finally did, I thought this turning out to be a great story. I was disappointed that it never really went anywhere after the big reveal. The captain and first mate characters weren't believable to the point of distraction. Having said all that, I found the setting to be engaging. The premise of the story was fresh and compelling albeit under utilized. It kept my interest until the end.

Great Story, just incomplete

Loved the characters, not a perfect book, but it will hold your interest. The ending needs re-work; it is incomplete and we are left with so many questions that should be answered after spending 11 hours with these characters.

The pace never lets up!

Excellent adventure story with a touch of the supernatural. I appreciate that the twists are not fully explained, leaving it to the imagination of the reader. The narration was superb. Highly recommend.

Stranded review

A brutally cold tale about a supply ship running into an earth shattering storm that sends the crew into a very claustrophobic and violent episode of the Twilight Zone. There is a lot of action and suspense. I felt like I had some questions about the plot right after I finished it but the more I thought about it I grew to appreciate the unknowns more. I would recommend this book to PKD fans as well. Parts of it reminded me of some of his work like Time Out Of Joint.

If you like high action and intense end of the world type stuff then you will like Stranded. This is my first Macleod book and I intend to read more. I see he has a book coming out with ChiZine. Any author that puts out a book with ChiZine will likely be read by me at some point. Also, I did listen to the audiobook through some of Stranded and it was well read by the narrator named PJ Ochlan. You can't go wrong in any form.