The Ship Asunder: A Maritime History of Britain in Eleven Vessels by Tom Nancollas

Perhaps it's my maritime heritage of being brought up at a port city or my academic studies, but anything to do with ships from history really excites me. Added to that, the brilliantly original idea of this book to make a (virtual) ship portraying England's seafaring history from artefacts from the great vessels of our country - well, that's me sorted!

Nancollas goes on the hunt for ships' parts and gives a tour and history of each town and port he visits. There is a chatty commentary, starting at the port and town of Dover and going through such places as London, Plymouth, Looe, Newlyn, Liverpool and Portsmouth. Always engaging and at times tense, this really is a fascinating and thrilling read as the author travels to dockyards, harbours, museums and ports to discover his eleven parts for his symbolic ship. The items include rope, a bell, a figurehead and an anchor, for example, and Nancollas explains how the items were made and how they were used. Often the descriptions are poetic and full, and include nautical terms, but always explained in pure layman's language, and diagrams, paintings and photographs illustrate, just to make sure.

Full as well, is the history of the places he visits and periods in which the ships lived. The first item is a Bronze Age prow and the following relics represent each period such as Tudor, Victorian, Georgian, Jacobean and so on, until the twentieth century and the World Wars. I like how there is always time for a pint as well.

An adventure story and a quest, this book could so easily have been a novel. The writing is imaginative and colourful, the story as good as many I have read and even better than a lot of them. For historians, seafarers and British folk or anyone who likes a a good book. This book is an absolute delight to read. Love it.

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Published by Penguin on 31 March 2022.
​Advance review copy supplied by the publisher.

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