GREAT BOOK! NO SPINE CREASES & MODERATE WEAR ON COVER. LIGHTLY AGED, SMUDGED

GREAT BOOK! NO SPINE CREASES & MODERATE WEAR ON COVER. LIGHTLY AGED, SMUDGED ON EDGE BUT NO MARKS IN TEXT. From Publishers Weekly: "Sharks are not the only peril faced by James Pfeiffer, age 20, as he works on a scallop trawler off the Rhode Island coast. Treacherous accidents and the risk of drug-running operations cloud the waters; the sting of losing his girlfriend adds bite to the salt air. Watkins, whose critically praised first novel, Night over Day over Night, was published when he himself was his hero's age (he is now 24), has worked on the ships he writes about, and his seafaring adventure is also a coming-of-age novel. James's mixture of love and contempt for his fisherman father Russ, coupled with Russ's fierce desire to see his son make something better of himself, drives the story. Among the crew members are an ex-Green Beret with psychotic tendencies and a hard-drinking former lumberjack. Watkins's spare, whittled-down prose does not buoy up the action, but readers will savor the realistic evocations of life at sea and the portrayal of a particular maritime subculture." Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc. From Library Journal: "This novel of a young man's indoctrination into his fisherman father's way of life is engaging, believable, and unromantic. So genuine are the events and dialogue that the book's flaws--melodramatic lines muttered as the father wakes from nightmares, the hero's tritely rendered entrepreneur brother, the occasional telegraphing of events intended to surprise-stand out in stark relief. Still, there are plenty of moments-most particularly, the moving ending, plausible yet startling-that evince Watkins's skill with plot. His greatest skill, however, is his outstanding descriptive power: Some of the images, including a barnacle-encrusted corpse and a crewman gravely injured by the dredge cables, are unforgettable. Readers who know the docks of the Atlantic fisheries will instantly recognize the rugged fishermen and rusted vessels Watkins depicts. Don't look for profundity here, but expect a good read: " Frank Pisano, Pennsylvania State Univ., University Park Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.