The Poseidon Adventure (1969-abridged) - Paul Gallico

Written by Paul Gallico
Read by Dylan Baker
Format: MP3
Bitrate: 64 Kbps
Abridged

Poseidon Series, Book 1
Publisher: HarperCollins
Release date: April 11, 2006
Duration: 06:32:48

The inspiration for two films, 1972 and the 2006 Warner Bros. film, Poseidon, Paul Gallico’s The Poseidon Adventure is an intense and dramatic story about a gigantic ocean liner and its unimaginable final journey.

When a rogue wave capsizes the luxury cruise ship, a small group of survivors find themselves unlikely allies in a battle for their lives. As the unstable vessel rapidly fills with water each must draw on skills and strengths they didn’t even know they possessed, fighting against time for their own survival and for each other.

Reviews of the audio book were very critical of Paul Gallico’s writing and compliment the narrator who they feel can little to improve it. Examples…

While Baker ably keeps Gallico’s potboiler afloat by providing distinct voices for a dozen different characters, the audio book starts taking on water thanks to some turgid and overripe dialogue from the source material that would sink even the best narrator. It turns out that Stirling Silliphant’s screenplay for the 1972 disaster movie actually improved the original book by paring down the number of people fighting their way up to the bottom of the luxury liner’s hull after a huge tidal wave capsizes the S.S. Poseidon

Narrator Dylan Baker does an impressive job with an array of characters, giving the impression of several narrators with Western and international accents. He also tries to engage listeners with a suspenseful narration, but he can’t overcome a cast of unsympathetic characters and an unrealistic plot involving dying people aboard a sinking ship. Characters who are one-dimensional and have similar names are impossible to track. When the preacher onboard curses God before committing suicide, even Baker’s skills can’t save the scene. The rape of a young girl is delivered with sobs yet lacks credibility when Baker must deliver her thoughts of affection instead of fear. There is little to recommend in this audio, other than Baker himself.

I used the written text to approximate the chapter, combining a few.

Readers in the 1960’s were less critical than those of the 2000’s. Think of this as 1969 novel as a piece of nostalgia from the time when the disaster films were king…The Towering Inferno, Earthquake, Krakatoa East of Java. Ah, those were the days…..J