Book Review: The Terror
Dan Simmons' Latest Novel Mixes Historical Fiction with Horror
What's worse than being lost and frozen in the ice with little food and months of day-long darkness? The men of the Franklin Expedition are about to find out.
Historical fiction based upon actual events are often full of factual information that tend to weigh the novel down. At almost 800 pages, one would get that initial impression from Dan Simmons' latest, The Terror, however they would be in for a surprise. While it is evident when reading through each gripping page, that Simmons did his homework with regard to his facts, they never seem to take anything away from the flow of the story itself. In fact, the research adds another layer to the story entirely.
The Factual Story Behind The Terror
The Terror is based on the historical accounts of the Franklin Expedition, the doomed British voyage to the Artic. In 1845, the two ships HMS Terror and HMS Erebus, under the command of Sir John Franklin, attempt to locate the Northwest Passage. Their ships become icebound and they slowly run out of supplies and coal to enable their survival. Though it is unknown about the causes of death, all men including Franklin perished of both natural and unnatural causes. Though most of the discovered bodies showed evidence of death by scurvy, lead poisoning (from contaminated canned food), starvation and cold, there was some strong evidence that also pointed to cannibalism.
Clearly, Simmons has a lot to work with. Given the facts of the Franklin Expedition, Simmons crafts his novel around filling in the blanks of what happened to these men on their fateful journey. He builds on the facts and offers readers a plausible and hauntingly scary explanation for their demise.
The Horror Elements Given to The Terror
Simmons takes an already dreadful story and fleshes it out with a menacing "thing on the ice" that stalks and brutally maims and kills members of both ships. As if the idea of being frozen in the deserted Artic with no way to contact the outside world, faced with months of darkness, with dwindling and contaminated food supplies and coal, and undertones of cannibalistic activities wasn't scary enough, this nameless stalking beast preys on the men at every turn.
While the idea of an ice creature may seem unrealistic, it further exemplifies the doom they face. The fact that these men are all sick, starving and on the verge of mutiny, only makes you want them to survive even more. With every inch of hardship that they face and overcome, they are compounded with two more around the corner. The men of the Franklin expedition are psychologically challenged in a way that humans, by nature, are incapable of handling.
The hopelessness of the book, along with the factual undertones, adds to the dread of each page. The novel is truly chilling, if only because of the truth behind the story. Simmons does a great job at redirecting the novel in a way that makes it universally terrifying. By taking basic human desires such as survival and hope, and mixing them with a doomed situation, the reader can't help but keep their fingers crossed for the happy ending.
Book Stats:
The Terror by Dan Simmons
Paperback, 784 pages
Published by Back Bay Books, 2007
ISBN#0316017450
