Fatal Storm: The Inside Story of the Tragic Sydney-Hobart Race

"Researched and written in 16 weeks (124 interviews transcribed into 300,000 words, Mundle informs us), FATAL STORM qualifies as a 'quickie,' churned out while the story was still reasonably fresh and, presumably, to take advantage of the continuing vogue for stories of death and heroism at sea. It's also a good book, within its limits. Mundle had a simple goal: to describe how the storm developed, what happened to the worst-hit boats and how the rescue operation unfolded. He succeeds in creating a lucid and engrossing story. Apart from frequent lapses into clich or hyperbole (not surprising given his deadline), Mundle writes in a straightforward style that provides a vivid sense of the random brutality of wind and waves, the surprising clear-headedness and tenacity of the distressed sailors, the singular courage and skill of the rescuers."Rob Mundle is the author of 'Fatal Storm: The Inside Story of the Tragic Sydney-Hobart Race', published 2000 under ISBN 9780071361408 and ISBN 0071361405.