Simmons

The terror by Dan Simmons (2007)

In 1845, the two ships of the Sir John Franklin Expedition left the United Kingdom to find the fabled Northwest Passage to China through the Canadian arctic. Called the HMSs Erebus and Terror, they held a combined crew of one hundred and twenty-nine men. Neither the ships nor any of the men would ever return.

The story of the Franklin Expedition is one of the great mysteries of modern history. There are so few clues as to what happened—some human remains, a few messages left in rock piles, and stories from local Eskimo tribes. That’s it. Because of this lack of information, it provides a neat, clean skeleton on which an interesting tale can be built if the author is imaginative enough. Fortunately, Dan Simmons is.

This novel mixes history, historical fiction and Gothic horror. Simmons’s characters are taken from the exhibition’s actual crew lists. He gives them personalities and uses some of their real-life backstories to flesh out characters. In the book, the men experience true historical events such as the sudden deaths of three crew members very early in the mission, a fateful decision that would trap the ships in ice for years, and the missions to leave progress reports and messages at designated points in the area. Beyond these, however, Simmons fills in the gaping spaces between the facts with a superb thriller.

One of the main traits of Gothic horror is how the setting impacts the mood of the work, how the author builds the environment to a point that itself becomes a major character within the story. It’s not just a stage on which the action moves, it plays a role in the plot and directly affects the decisions of the actors. Its elements create a sense of melancholy, uneasiness and/or dread in the reader. After this sense is stimulated in the reader does the story really begin. To accomplish this, the writer needs to master the art of description. The reader needs to feel the eeriness of the setting instead of just reading about it. For me, the gold-standard for this is Edgar Allan Poe. Dan Simmons is up to the task, however.

Simmons’s descriptive powers transports the reader into the story. It is told in first-person, from the points-of-view of several crew members as the story unfolds. We hear their thoughts, feelings, and regrets. We are in on their decision-making and know why they act in specific ways. Through meticulous description, we see the banged-up condition of these ships as the story begins two years into the disastrous journey; we hear the creaking, banging and explosions of the ice floes that move and shift around the fragile vessels; we feel the freezing cold of the minus double- and triple-digit temperatures in the constant struggle to survive this unforgiving environment; we smell the dank griminess of closed-in spaces inhabited by men with two-years-worth of almost non-existent personal hygiene. Simmons surrounds the reader in misery and regret, depression and desperation. Within this framework, barbaric nature clashes with human nature while the leaders struggle to maintain the tattered remnants of British civilization. Then something else arrives to complicate things.

There is one scene early in the book that is a masterclass of authorship. It is told in flashback and is carefully worded and deliberately paced, resulting in a creepy, scary scene where the tension rises slowly to a sudden, violent climax. The action was there and gone so fast in a blink-and-you-miss-it moment I had to reread it several times. It is superb storytelling and my favorite part.

Another example of Simmons’ talent involves a sunrise. These men are trapped above the Arctic Circle and do not see the sun for months on end. The story begins after the autumnal equinox and throughout the first part of the book the reader reads about the men’s hopelessness and depression during this long night. Simmons slowly drags the timeline out, letting the endless darkness mold the story and the characters. When finally, when the sun rises again in the spring, the joy of the men has real emotional impact. The reader feels the emotions of the crew. These two scenes are the product of an author who truly understands his craft.

It is rare that something I’m reading makes me want to stay up into the small hours to read but I could not put this book down. This is a good, good book.