Rating: 
Summary: Outstanding True Story of Adventure - Tough to Put Down
Review: This book was outstanding. Philbrick's writing style is so vivid and detailed you almost feel yourself walking the streets of Nantucket and sailing on a whaling ship. Philibrick really did his homework on this book as every detail of the adventure has been researched and verified for accuracy. Some might find it a little too detailed (the notes at the end were a but much for me) but the story was so interesting I found myself wanting to know as much as possible about every facet of this gripping tale. A must read if you like adventure stories.
Rating:
Summary: Want to know how to eat somebody?
Review: Nathaniel Philbrick is not a squeamish man, and most readers (including me) will remember the...uh...culinary sections of this book long after the rest has faded away.The book's title is slightly misleading: while Philbrick does detail the story of the Essex, he spends large sections of the book setting the background with a discussion of the whaling industry and contemporary seafaring in general. This information is fascinating (if you don't care about eating anyone, perhaps you want to know how to process a whale carcass?), but often tangential to the story, and readers shouldn't expect a Jon-Krakauer-style narrative that grabs you by the collar on page one and never lets you go. But I still loved the book and would heartily recommend it to anyone.
Rating: 
Summary: Not a nail-biter
Review: This is an incredible story, but the presentation is rather dry, almost like a history book. The writing pales in comparison to Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage by Alfred Lansing.
Rating: 
Summary: A Whale of a Disappointment
Review: Nathaniel Philbrick has written a research paper and had it published as a novel. The book has 302 pages, which includes 64 pages of notes, bibliography, acknowledgements and index. The story is interesting and worth the read, but one thing that struck me as odd in the authors referral to the black members of the ship's crew as "African Americans". Keep in mind that this story occurred in 1820. I hardly think that the use of the politically correct term African American was even conceived at that time. The author also seems to want to build the case that because the black members of the crew were the first to die, that there may have been racial reasons for this to occur. He discusses the difference in body fat content between blacks and whites, and the closeness of the Nantucket Quakers, which may have accounted for the whites being treated differently while trying to survive at sea. The possibility of racism is raised a couple of times, but then quickly dismissed. I would recommend that unless you have a burning desire to read this book immediately, that you wait for the paper back edition. It is sure to be a better value.
Rating: 
Summary: A gripping and horrific adventure.
Review: Nathanial Philbrick's new book contains a story of high adventure with all the right ingredients of adventure, danger and triumph. It is also a story firmly grounded in reality and the account contains many aspects (such as cannibalism and the thinly concealed social politics) that raise the book above being another page-turner. Coming from England I was familiar with Shackleton's similar experience almost a century later and had thought that that was probably the ultimate adventure at sea but this account far surpasses that. The different social make-up of the Essex's survivors makes the whole adventure very different, and indeed it is used very effectively as a vehicle to examine the structure of the whaling society of the time. The combined stranglehold of class and religion upon the society of the time is well illustrated. Overall, the book is suprisingly short. It packs a lot of detail into its pages but has left me wanting more. It's given me an appetite for reading about the life and times of sailing ships and their crews that I'm sure to follow up.
Rating:
Summary: A gripping tale
Review: Philbrick not only tells the tragic story of the Essex, but provides details about the time period and other tragedies of the kind. I could not put this book down once the Essex was attacked by the whale.
Rating:
Summary: Fascinating tale, but not for the quesy
Review: This story of the sinking of the Nantucket whaleship Essex is fascinating on several levels. Rammed by an apparently angry sperm whale, the crew spends months sailing in small whaleboats seeking safe haven. They resort to cannabalism to survive--first eating the dead, but later drawing lots to decide who is to die. Along the way, the author describes life in Nantucket in the early 1800s, how whaleships were organized, the capturing and exploiting of whales, why whaleships took two and three year tours into the Pacific, and why whale oil made ship owners so rich. But in the end, the cannabalism, and the reaction of Nantucket society to it, is the focus of the story. Written in easy-to-read prose, it makes for quick summer reading.
Rating:
Summary: Riveting Survival Account
Review: I just finished reading "In the Heart of the Sea" yesterday. Once I started it I kept reading. Mr. Philbrick knows his subject very well. He communicates the story and does not overwhelm you with facts which can be a trapdoor set for an author with extensive an understanding of his subject. Mr. Philbrick presents additional material e.g. cannibalism that fits in well and does not distract the reader from the story. It is a tremendous story of survival. You find yourself watching how decisions were made and who made them, what survivors chose to do in certain circumstances, how race played a role, etc. Life was hard in the whaling industry of the last century. This book provides one with an education in addition to being an incredible story of survival. I would like to read this book again. I read it fast because I got caught up in the story.
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Summary: True Adventure of Castaways Battling Nature and Themselves
Review: "In the Heart of the Sea" is a very good book. Like "The Perfect Storm", to which it will obviously be compared to, the author balances the story with historic and scientific background information. The combination works very well, informing the reader with fascinating tidbits while leaving him or her gripped in the thralls of a great tale. This is the story of the whaleship Essex, out of Nantucket on a two year voyage to the Pacific in search of the early nineteenth century's liquid gold, whale oil. The unthinkable happens. A usually docile sperm whale, although large enough to sink a wooden ship, does just that. Rammed twice by an 85 foot leviathan of the sea, the crew takes to three whale boats while its ship is crushed and rendered useless. The resulting ninety day journey is a story of hope, discipline, tragic mistakes, and ever present thirst and starvation which leads the men ever closer to having to execute the "law of the sea" in order to survive. Nathaniel Philbrick weaves first person accounts from survivors, a concise history of Nantucket and the work of catching and rendering whales as well as the physiology of the giant sea mammels and starvation into a first rate book. I read this over three days -- it moves very quickly. The author has a talent for fleshing out his common whalemen so that they are interesting and distinct characters without sacrificing authenticity and fact. If you liked "The Perfect Storm" or Jon Krakauer's "Into Thin Air," you'll find "In the Heart of the Sea" very much in the same vein. A story of people under terrible physical and mental assault which the reader could not imagine enduring, coupled with a superbly explained telling of the issues at hand that is well set in its place and time. Highly recommended -- you may want to finish this one all at once.
Rating:
Summary: A harrowing whale "tale"
Review: On the one hand, you think to yourself, why would I voluntarily subject myself to reading about nineteenth century sailors, stranded at sea, thousands of miles from S. America, resorting to cannibalism? On the other hand, once you start this well-researched and beautifully written book, you cannot put it down. It teaches, not only of the whale trade, Nantucket, and life at sea, but about human nature and (even) race relations on a Nantucket whale ship. Philbrick should be congratulated for magnifying a tiny piece of forgotten history.
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