The African Queen
A classic story of adventure and romance - the novel that inspired the legendary movie starring Katherine Hepburn and Humphrey Bogart A fast-moving tale and a very good yarn...Mr Forester again and again proves himself a master of suspense- New York Times Book Review As World War I reaches the heart of the African jungle, Charlie Allnutt and Rose Sayer, a dishevelled trader and an English spinster missionary, find themselves thrown together by circumstance. Fighting time, heat, malaria, and bullets, they make their escape on the rickety steamboat The African Queen...and hatch their own outrageous military plan. Originally published in 1935, The African Queenis a tale replete with vintage Forester drama - unrelenting suspense, reckless heroism, impromptu military manoeuvres, near-death experiences - and a good old-fashioned love story to boot.
Stats for nerds
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What Hacker News says
- Are you reading by opening up to page 1 and reading through to the end? Don't do that. I know, I know, spoilers, but unless you're reading mysteries, it's not a big deal. The best fiction isn't just the ending. Everyone knows Captain Ahab dies at the end of Moby Dick, but that doesn't spoil anything.
So, read the first chapter. Read the beginning and end of the rest of the chapters – a few paragraphs, a page, something. Read the last chapter.
Analyze the story: make a list of characters and their relationships to each other. If there are people related to each other, make a family tree. Consider the locations: map them out, especially if they reference real world locations. Get a feel for how the story moves through the world. Tolkien's books are famous for including the family trees of his characters, timelines, and world maps. Do that.
Try reading a novel that's been made into a good film. Follow along reading and comparing the film adaptation to the novel. Something like C. S. Forester's book The African Queen and the 1951 film directed by John Huston.
Pick a novel that riffs on subjects you're already into. Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar involves psychology as a major plot element, as do One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and Requiem for a Dream. All three have been adapted into excellent films.
- A rare early cube farm science fiction story by the author of the Horatio Hornblower series, Sink The Bismarck, The African Queen (1935), The Good Shepherd / Greyhound, and The Ship (1943) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horatio_Hornblower -- https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sink_the_Bismarck! -- https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greyhound_(film) -- https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ship_(novel)
