King O' the Beach: A Tropic Tale
1899
A young passenger. A shipwreck. A volcanic island crawling with danger. When Carey Cranford sails from England to join his parents in Australia, he expects adventure. What he gets is a nightmare. A fall from the rigging leaves him unconscious, and when he wakes, the Chusan has run aground on a remote volcanic island in the Indian Ocean. Now Carey, the ship's doctor, and a tough old sailor named Bob Bostock must survive together, marooned on a shore where a sinister beachcomber lurks, storms howl, and something far worse prowls the tropical night. Fenn delivers Victorian adventure at its most visceral: tight character dynamics, mounting dread, and a setting that feels both beautiful and lethal. The stakes are simple but savage: survive or perish. It's a story that pul
Editions
X-Ray
“Every day is a new day. It is better to be lucky. But I would rather be exact. Then when luck comes you are ready.””
— George Manville Fenn
“But man is not made for defeat," he said. "A man can be destroyed but not defeated.””
— George Manville Fenn
“Now is no time to think of what you do not have.Think of what you can do with that there is””
— George Manville Fenn
“Let him think that I am more man than I am and I will be so.””
— George Manville Fenn
“Why do old men wake so early? Is it to have one longer day?””
— George Manville Fenn
“Most people were heartless about turtles because a turtle’s heart will beat for hours after it has been cut up and butchered. But the old man thought, I have such a heart too.””
— George Manville Fenn
“It's silly not to hope. It's a sin he thought.””
— George Manville Fenn
“I may not be as stong as I think, but I know many tricks and I have resolution.””
— George Manville Fenn
“He always thought of the sea as 'la mar' which is what people call her in Spanish when they love her. Sometimes those who love her say bad things of her but they are always said as though she were a woman. Some of the younger fishermen, those who used buoys as floats for their lines and had motorboats, bought when the shark livers had brought much money, spoke of her as 'el mar' which is masculine.They spoke of her as a contestant or a place or even an enemy. But the old man always thought of her as feminine and as something that gave or withheld great favours, and if she did wild or wicked things it was because she could not help them. The moon affects her as it does a woman, he thought.””
— George Manville Fenn
