Mutiny: A Novel of the Bounty [Hardcover]

John Boyne - isn't he the one that wrote....? Yes Boyne is the author of the hugely successful historical fiction bestseller, The Boy in the Striped Pajamas.

Boyne turns his talents into a re-telling of the ill fated 1789 voyage of The Bounty to harvest breadfruit on what is now known as the island of Tahiti. The breadfruit was destined to feed slaves in Jamaica. After a long and difficult voyage, many men questioned William Bligh's leadership and a mutiny occurred. Bligh and 19 loyal men were turned out into a small launch and left to live or die. Bligh managed to guide them to land over the course of 48 days. Most of them did survive. Many books have been written, recounting this event.

Boyne's novel, although faithful to historical fact, is character driven. It is told from the viewpoint of 14 yr. old John Jacob Turnstile. Turnstile is given a choice - serve his gaol sentence for thievery or sign on as the captain's servant boy on the Bounty. The ship is his choice. Having never sailed before, we are treated to seeing the vessel, the traditions, the crew, Bligh himself and the fate of The Bounty's historic voyage through the curious eyes of "Turnip", as he is known to the crew. Turnstile is a wonderfully engaging character. His dialogue is witty, sharp and humorous. He is wise beyond his years in certain ways and yet naive in other matters. His documentation of the ship's crew, their personalities and what may have led to the mutiny are a fresh look at a known story. Knowing the history of the Bounty did in no way detract from the reading of Boyne's book. Boyne is a consummate story teller and The Mutiny on the Bounty is a heck of a tale. Highly recommended.

This is the 1st and perhaps only book on the HMS Bounty that i've read and, therefore, can not say how it stacks up to others like it, but let me tell you, this book was fantastic. This review will be brief so that any one who does read it will have a fresh go of it.

Basically, an urchin boy (John Jacob Turnstile) is caught pick-pocketing a pocket watch from a gentleman by the name of Mr. Zela...the boy gets caught, in leu of a prison sentence of a year he is "sentenced" to the "high-seas" aboard the HMS Bounty as the Captain's Servant...a lot of trials and trivulations...native love...mutany...more suffering...rescue...and a little finality.

I have read just about anything I could find about the Bounty story and I found this book to be pretty entertaining. It's a novel, of course, and Boyne takes the liberty of making Bligh out to be an extremely sympathetic character and Fletcher Christian into a dilattante near-fop. I think both characterizations are off the mark but it's Boyne's book after all.

He cleverly puts the teenage pickpocket, John Jacob Turnstile, on the boat as Bligh's servant in place of the real-life John Smith who was Bligh's servant. And since the servant is usually in Bligh's cabin or hovering nearby, Turnstile is able to pick up on many conversations between Bligh and his officers, particularly with Christian.

However, I think Boyne made a couple of big errors in the book. Later, when Turnstile, Bligh and 16 others are fighting for survival in the lifeboat after the mutiny, Turnstile and another sailor talk about how much they hated the ship's clerk, Mr. Samuel, and how they found it typical of the man that he'd joined Christian's mutineers. But Samuel wasn't a mutineer, he was with Bligh in the lifeboat and is mentioned several times in the lifeboat story up to that point. So how in the world did Boyne put that conversation in the book and state that Samuel was a mutineer?

Also, at the very end of the book Turnstile has just gone to Bligh's funeral in 1817 and meets his mysterious benefactor from the beginning of the story. But Turnstile never mentions anywhere at the end of the book that he had any knowledge of what happened to Christian and the other mutineers who hadn't been caught. I think that's preposterous. The surviving mutineer, John Adams, and the descendants of the Bounty mutineers were found on Pitcairn Island several years before Bligh's death and that discovery was the talk of all England. It's just impossible that Turnstile, who by that point of the story has had a long naval career, would not have heard about Pitcairn. It should've been mentioned and it is a huge omission.

Boyne also tones down the real conflict between Bligh and the ship's master, John Fryer. Fryer is portrayed very sympathetically but in reality Bligh and Fryer despised each other on the Bounty, in the lifeboat and after they returned to England. Some of that is used in the book but not enough, probably in the attempt to humanize Bligh. Lastly, Boyne doesn't even mention the big disputes that arose after the Bounty stopped for supplies and repairs at Tasmania (Van Dieman's Land as it was called back then). Perhaps he left it out of the story to keep the book to the length he wanted but some of the seeds of mutiny were sowed there and I think it could've been included.

Nonetheless, you'll like the book whether you're a Bounty historian or not.

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