THE WRECK OF THE MARY DEARE

One March night, the MARY DEARE, an enormous leaking freighter, looms out of a rising gale to nearly capsize a salvage yacht in the English Channel. The skipper of the yacht boards the MARY DEARE to find that it has been set afire and abandoned by its crew. The only one left is a half-mad captain whose future lies with his battered boat. Narrator Bill Wallis perfectly captures the intensity of one of Hammond Innes's best mystery/adventure stories. It's all here in Wallis's nuanced delivery--the bone-deep exhaustion and edgy craziness of the DEARE's captain; the skipper's youthful high spirits and then his dawning awareness of danger and mystery; the storm itself, whipped into furious presence by Wallis's staccato delivery. This is wonderful stuff brilliantly told. A.C.S. © AudioFile 2001, Portland, Maine [Published: AUG/ SEP 01]