North Sun

North Sun, or the Voyage of the Whaleship Esther, is set in the last days of the American whaling industry. In 1878 the crew of the Esther leaves New Bedford confident that the sea will yield to them. They plan to cruise the Pacific for whales and then hunt the rich northern grounds before the ice closes in.

Their final destination is the Chukchi Sea, where Captain Arnold Lovejoy has an urgent directive of his own to carry out. As they head there, their encounters with the natural world turn more brutal, harrowing, ghostly and strange.

The novel is an allegory of extraction and a story of adventure and endurance. It keeps one foot in the traditional sea-voyage narrative and the other in a fierce mythology of its own. It takes an unsparing look at the cost of environmental exploitation and predation, speaking to the present and future as much as the past. It is the author's debut novel.