Weekly Summary

The pefect storm summary

Week 1 Chapters 1-3 (pages 1-64)

1. Setting /Plot:

2. The book takes place in 1869 to 1991 in the ocean. Junger tells the story of the Andrea Gail in mostly chronological order, beginning in chapter 1 with the six fishermen saying their good-byes at "The Crow's Nest."

3. Themes:

Im not sure yet what the theme is but I think the title of the book will be a major part of the themes somehow.

4. Structure:

Junger's intention of writing a completely factual book is noble, he not only makes up conversations, but also reconstructs the whole disaster by guesswork. Therefore, The Perfect Storm is not completely factual. No one survived the Andrea Gail. No one on board kept records. The crew was not in radio contact with anyone when it went through this disaster. Junger made up a version of events by talking to fishermen who survived similar storms. The Perfect Storm is a fictionalized account of true events.

5. Genre:

The genre for The Perfect Storm seems to be a nature, creative nonfiction

"DAWN at sea, a grey void emerging out of a vaster black one." The earth was without form and darkness was upon the face of the deep." Whoever wrote that knew the sea-- knew the pale emergence of the world every morning, a world that contained absolutely nothing, not one thing. "

6. Style of Writing: Junger has two modes of writing. Most of the book is written in a factual journalistic style with long passages of history and science. About a fourth of the book is pure literature, full of metaphor and beauty of language. For example, Junger can write about a human being's drowning in the most technical, medical terms: "Chemical sensors in the brain trigger an involuntary breath whether he's underwater or not. This is called the 'break point;' laboratory experiments have shown the break point to come after 87 seconds. ... Until the break point, a drowning person is said to be undergoing 'voluntary apnea."'

7. Two New Character Details:

Tyne,

Is an adolescent boy that does not know what profession he wants to be in, He's the captain of the Andrea Gail.

Shatford,

Is one of the six crew members of the Andrea Gail. He is in his early forties and separated from his wife and two children

Week2 Chapters 4-7 (Pages 65-146)

1. Setting:

The Perfect Storm has about 2 main settings so far, the ocean, the Andrea Gail. The ocean setting is more than about two thirds of the whole book, he goes in to details about the waves, the water, what the waves could do to certain boats if the waves got to big etc. The Andrea Gail is a place where much of the action of the book takes place. He describes it in such detail that the reader is privy to its structure down to square footage of the galley.

2. Plot:

The 6 fishermen have just decided to start heading home, because they have load there boat with about 40,000 pounds of sword fish. On the journey home there appears to be three weather systems will converging and creating "the perfect storm" a storm that only happens perhaps once every couple hundred years. Even with knowing this information Billy Tyne stills decides to keep heading home, even though this decision will put him in the center of the bad weather... Now rescue teams are looking for the missing boat.

3. Two New Characters Details:

* Christine Cotter

In her early forties, she is divorced and has three children of her own. She told herself she would never get involved with a fisherman because of the danger and uncertainty of the profession, but nevertheless fell in love with Bobby

* Ray Leonard

Leonard is the owner of the Satori, a large pleasure boat that he is sailing to Bermuda when Hurricane Grace hits. He is one of the only characters in the book that is presented in a bad light.

4. Themes:

There are many themes in this book but the main themes I believe to be are men against the sea and man vs. nature. The themes have a link to the title, a "The Perfect Storm" it's a storm, the storm is nature, and the nature is against the men, "men against the sea, man vs. nature".

5. Structure:

The Perfect Storm is mostly told in a chronical order. The author give us lots of information about different aspects of the fishing industry, meteorology, oceanography, the subculture of fishing, a history of fishing in New England, the physics of human drowning, and other arcane topics

6. Genre:

This genre of books is a mixture of nature and sea story. These genres are perfect for this book because nature is natural world, physical world, or material world, which is perfect for this book, sea story because all most all of this book is on the sea. For example "They are among the very highest waves measured anywhere in the world, ever."