I've read this book at least twice before, possibly more. It was originally handed to me by Jamie Fenner (so I can date the first reading to 1997), and I've recommended it to many people to read. I'll go ahead and say now, this book is on the amazing, "let me buy you a copy" part of my book review scale.

The full title of this book is "Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage" if you're going to look for it in the library or bookstore.

In mid-1914, Ernest Shackleton and his crew set sail on the Endurance on their way to Antarctica, with the intent of crossing the continent on foot. Along the way, the Endurance is trapped in ice sheets, and is eventually crushed, forcing the crew to disembark, save as many of the supplies as possible, and survive until they are rescued.

Except, this is before radio were commonplace. Before the technology we rely on to save us (satellites, phones, GPS, etc.) even existed. To be rescued, the crew pretty much had to go help themselves.

I'm not revealing anything by commenting EVERYONE LIVES, but holy moly is the story amazing. And nearly unbelievable. That you don't have a boatload of unemotional machines means there's the whole list of human problems, interactions, struggles, and successes.

The story reads quickly, and wow, I just love it.

And my warm bed.

Outside this planking, to keep her from being chafed by the ice, there was a sheathing from stem to stern of greenheart, a wood so heavy it weighs more than solid iron and so tough that it cannot be worked with ordinary tools.
Page 18

I am developing a fascination with greenheart wood as we speak.

The conversion of the Endurance from a ship into a kind of floating shore station brought with it a marked slowdown in the tempo of life. There simply wasn’t much for the men to do. The winter schedule required of them only about three hours’ work a day, and the rest of the time they were free to do what they wanted.
Page 40

And here is where one has to consider what they did with their days.

It was remarkable that there were not more cases of friction among the men, especially after the Antarctic night set in. The gathering darkness and the unpredictable weather limited their activities to an ever-constricting area around the ship. There was very little to occupy them, and they were in closer contact with one another than ever. But instead of getting on each other’s nerves, the entire party seemed to become more close-knit.
Page 50

I find this fascinating. It also plays a large part in my increasing love of this book and the whole tale. In adverse conditions, humans are at their worst. And sometimes their best. Experienced trademen succeed when they do what needs to be done, and this seems to be the philosophy of the crew. Doesn't matter if you like it or not, if it needs to be done, you do it.

A large part of the book talks about how the crew managed to stay a relatively cohesive unit, despite the long, cold days. Incredibly fascinating.

Though Hurley was a skilled photographer and an excellent worker, he was also the sort of man who responded best to flattery, who frequently needed to be jollied along and made to feel important. Shackleton sensed this need—he may even have overestimated it—and he was afraid that unless he catered to it, Hurley might feel slighted and possibly spread discontent among the others.
Page 90

More insights into human nature, and how good leaders understand, adapt to it.

In some ways they had come to know themselves better. In this lonely world of ice and emptiness, they had achieved at least a limited kind of contentment. They had been tested and found not wanting.

They thought of home, naturally, but there was no burning desire to be in civilization for its own sake.
Page 103

Until the march from Ocean Camp they had nurtured in the backs of their minds the attitude Shackleton strove so unceasingly to imbue them with, a basic faith in themselves—that they could, if need be, pit their strength and their determination against any obstacle—and somehow overcome it.
Page 117

But the fundamental, underlying factor in these discussions was that, for many men, the dogs were more than so many pounds of pulling power on the trail; there was a deep emotional attachment involved. It was the basic human need to love something, the desire to express tenderness in this barren place. Though the dogs were vicious, surly beasts with one another, their devotion and loyalty toward the men was above question. And the men responded with an affection greatly surpassing anything they would have felt under ordinary circumstances.
Page 120

And all the defenses they had so carefully constructed to prevent hope from entering their minds collapsed. Macklin, who had consistently struggled to remain hard-headedly pessimistic, found it impossible to hold out any longer.
Page 136

“It certainly looks promising.” But then he added: “Hope tells a flattering tale.”
Page 145

That she does.

Wild launched into a series of stories about his past escapades involving ladies, and McIlroy lived up to his reputation as the most cosmopolitan member of the expedition by explaining to an attentive audience his recipe for mixing several cocktails, including one guaranteed aphrodisiac called “The Bosom Caresser.”
Page 145

Laughing!

Even after the men were out of their tents, there was confusion about exactly what was the trouble and where the danger was. They groped their way around in the dark, bumping into one another and stumbling into unseen holes in the ice.
Page 146

For the most part, we in modern times don't understand the dark. We don't have the collective experience for just how black the night is without a moon. We don't understand how dangerous moving quickly in the complete dark can be.

Shackleton had already made up his mind, after long discussions with Wild, not only as to who should be taken, but who should not be left behind.
...
And Shackleton was not sure that Crean’s rough, tactless nature would lend itself well to a period of enforced and perhaps long waiting.
...
But both Shackleton and Wild felt that [McNeish] was still a potential troublemaker and not a good man to be left behind.
Page 193

And this is what a leader does: understands the nuances of a team, plays to its strengths, and minimizes its weaknesses.

enemy. Unlike the land, where courage and the simple will to endure can often see a man through, the struggle against the sea is an act of physical combat, and there is no escape. It is a battle against a tireless enemy in which man never actually wins; the most that he can hope for is not to be defeated.

Lansing, Alfred. Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage (pp. 225-226). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
Page

Instead, life was reckoned in periods of a few hours, or possibly only a few minutes—an endless succession of trials leading to deliverance from the particular hell of the moment.
Page 230

Over and over again, a thousand times each day, this drama was re-enacted. Before long, to the men on board the Caird, it lost all elements of awesomeness and they found it routine and commonplace instead, as a group of people may become inured to the perils of living in the shadow of an active volcano.
Page 229

They're in a tiny boat. The boat is going up and over waves that tower fifty feet above them, able to crash a hundred million tons of water on them every surge, and they become used to it.

They had been the underdog, fit only to endure the punishment inflicted on them.

But sufficiently provoked, there is hardly a creature on God’s earth that ultimately won’t turn and attempt to fight, regardless of the odds. In an unspoken sense, that was much the way they felt now. They were possessed by an angry determination to see the journey through—no matter what.
Page 239

Well, at least this book wasn't quite as tiresome as the previous book in the series, but that doesn't mean it was actually good. I mean, yes, if you're a fan of Mira Grant, then, no, wait, not even if you're a fan of Mira Grant. I'm a fan of Mira Grant's books from the Feed trilogy, and I found these books so incredibly sloooooooow.

Yes, we know that all life wants to live. We get that.

Yes, we know you're a worm who is in a human body and there are ethical issues surrounding that takeover. We get that.

Yes, we know that you love Nathan, tolerate Cale, and can't stand Sherman. We get that.

But say it all in fewer words.

Again, this book feels like each chapter was written as a short story, with Grant (not her real name) needing to explain (again) each part of the story's history in order to give some action. No, it wasn't needed. A small saving grace is that at least there's more action in this book than the last one.

Both of these books needed an editor who was willing to actually use her powers of editing to cut down on the repetitions. If I said this about Rowling, I can say it about Grant: Too. Many. Words.

Not recommended.

The point of no return is a philosophical construct, an idea that looks beautiful on paper or in a computer model, but which cannot hold up under the bearing strain of reality. The point of no return is reached in a thousand places at the same time, a thousand little fractal iterations all coming together and collapsing until the center cannot hold.
Page 7

"I had lived the first six years of my life going along the path of least resistance and letting other people make my decisions for me."
Page 19

Welcome to most people's first 18 years of life.

The human tendency to focus on the inconsequential to avoid focusing on the traumas at hand could be completely ridiculous at times.
Page 21

"Breaking things is human. It’s stupid and dangerous and irresponsible, but it’s human."
Page 85

That was human nature rearing its ugly head again: Break what you can’t control; destroy what you can’t understand.
Page 85

I wanted to live. I wanted to make it home. I wanted to see how this was going to end.
Page 138

YAWN. Yes. We know. We f'ing know this already. This is, by the way, the only reason I kept reading this book, even though I did so at lightning speed. In retrospect, I should have just read the summary from some website.

"Being a monster is not the same as being a bad person. It just means you’re willing to eat the world if that’s what you have to do to keep yourself alive. You really want to tell me that you wouldn’t eat the world if that was what you had to do?"
Page 163

"You’re insane.”

“I hate that word. All it means is ‘you don’t think like I do,’ and by that standard, everyone is insane."
Page 163

While the book is slow going, it does have a few zingers, bits of truth in it.

People would always be telling her who and what she had to be. At least this way, she could choose one of the things that would define her to the rest of the world.

Page 173

I wanted to ask why it was our good luck, and not the bad luck of the original owner — who had clearly either become a sleepwalker or been devoured by them—that mattered here.
Page 190

“Knowing the direction doesn’t mean you have to go.”
Page 194

"This is not what I intended. This is all her fault."
STAGE I: GENETIC DRIFT
Page 201

Unsurprisingly, this completely fits with the Sherman character: arrogant and impulsive, and completely unable to accept responsibility for his own actions. Grant got this part right.

"What if I did something wrong, and messed up Juniper the way the Mitchells had damaged me?"
Page 209

Blah blah blah, no, the Sal character isn't special. ALL parents feel this way. Every. Fucking. One.

Science is a powerful tool, but like any tool, it doesn’t care whether it hurts you. Fire warms us, cooks our food, protects us from predators, but it will burn us if we let it. Fire is more than happy to eat us all alive. Science is fire writ large.
Page 227

Humanity has always been disturbingly happy to sacrifice its future on the altar of right now.
Page 227

Hello, block of chocolate, meet my hips.

I had said it before.
Page 240

Yes, and sadly, we heard it. Over and over and over and over and over again.

It was nothing compared to what came next.
Page 262

JEEZ, this was another annoying part of this book. It was full of "and you won't believe what happens next." Ooooooo, foreshadowing. Editor, cut out all of these, except maybe (MAYBE) one.

“So… I’m doing this?”

The drums had stopped.

Everything was silence.

“This is me, somehow?”
Page 264

You know what? I have no idea what I was thinking when I highlighted this passage. I could go back and find it, but I don't care enough about this book to do so.

"When he came to USAMRIID to break me out, I could have screamed. I could have refused to go."
Page 265

Ah. This part. This is where Sal tries to argue that despite making the best decision should possibly could at the time she made it, no, it wasn't the best decision in retrospect.

Except, YOU CAN'T KNOW THAT. Looking back like this is complete bullshit. No, you couldn't have done better. No, you couldn't have made a better choice. No, you couldn't have screamed or refused to go, because youre priorities were different at that moment and those were the choices you made.

I can't stand this historical rewriting that everyone does.

So I went with him willingly,
Page 265

No, you didn't. You went under duress. There's a difference. There's a huge f'ing difference.

Who writes this crap?

Oddly, she was perfectly happy to have Beverly accompany me while she stayed behind. As long as there was a dog with me, she believed I would come back.
Page 272

Dogs are like that.

Haven’t you ever noticed how when a man says one thing, and the woman says another thing, people will almost always believe the man is the one who’s telling the truth? Even if she has more proof than he does.
Page 278

Yep. Same in the real world. Grant nailed that one.

“It’s interesting, isn’t it, how facts fall down in the face of appearances?
Page 286

All about marketing. Thought for another post, I'm sure.

“Amateurs. Evil amateurs, which is the worst kind. Couldn’t we have had the villains we deserved?”
Page 352

dead. How much time were we going to spend arguing about the dead before we started to understand how unimportant they were compared to the living?
Page 355

But still, I should have found a way to stop him.
Page 379

More annoying history rewriting. You know what? Sometimes you CAN'T. Especially when the author just wants to write a whiny character.

“She’s a spitfire and a half,” he said. “Always running for the hills and shouting when they don’t come to meet her.”
Page 380

“It’s weird when you say things that make sense,” I said.

Fishy beamed. “I am the living incarnation of the Konami Code.”
Page 403

This cracked me up.

I had asked once whether amnesia was a form of dying, and I had been assured that no, no, it was just a second chance at figuring out who you really were.
Page 415

Putting yourself in harm’s way over and over again is not the most effective means of committing suicide.
Page 429

Survival is the main drive of any living organism.
Page 433

If we didn't know this fact before reading this book, WE F'ING KNOW IT NOW.

I considered telling him what Fishy had said, about not blaming babies for the things they did before they were born. Babies didn’t ask to exist, but once they did, they wanted to keep going.
Page 433

SEE?

We walk on the graves of our unborn selves, the futures we never got to live, and some of those people wouldn’t get along very well with the ones we actually decided to be.
Page 452

The thought was sobering. How many people’s motives didn’t match up with what I’d taken for their actions? How many villains were the heroes of their own stories?
Page 457

Every. F'ing. One. Of. Them.