Surviving Savannah by Patti Callahan
Release Date: March 9, 2021
Publisher: Berkley
Genre: Historical Fiction
Formats: eBook, Hardcover, Paperback, Audiobook
Pages: 432
When Savannah history professor Everly Winthrop is asked to guest-curate a new museum collection focusing on artifacts recovered from the steamship Pulaski, she's shocked. The ship sank after a boiler explosion in 1838, and the wreckage was just discovered, 180 years later. Everly can't resist the opportunity to try to solve some of the mysteries and myths surrounding the devastating night of its sinking.Everly's research leads her to the astounding history of a family of eleven who boarded the Pulaski together, and the extraordinary stories of two women from this family: a known survivor, Augusta Longstreet, and her niece, Lilly Forsyth, who was never found, along with her child. These aristocratic women were part of Savannah's society, but when the ship exploded, each was faced with difficult and heartbreaking decisions. This is a moving and powerful exploration of what women will do to endure in the face of tragedy, the role fate plays, and the myriad ways we survive the surviving.
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My Review:
This book was beautifully written, painstakingly researched, and so moving. When I first looked up this book, I had never heard of the Pulaski disaster but I put it on my TBR because I'm planning a trip to Savannah in the next year and love to get the feel for places I'm visiting through books. Now? Now I'm completely obsessed with the fascinating, horrific tale of the doomed steamship, Pulaski.
The author weaves the story so well it's almost as if you are there in 1838 with Augusta, Lilly, and the other passengers of the Pulaski watching the horror unfold as the ship exploded and then on the lifeboats and floating on the decks left behind when the ship sinks. You feel the terror, the exhaustion, the helpless and hopelessness of the survivors as well as the grief for those lost forever.
In the present time, Everly's story arc is so satisfying. We meet a woman who has basically closed herself off to any enjoyment in life and isolated herself from friends after a tragedy in her own life a year earlier and through curating the museum exhibit for the Pulaski and trying to uncover Augusta and Lilly's stories we see the spark return to her. She opens herself back up to old friends, including the former fiancé of her late friend Mora and makes a new friend in Maddox, who is leading the salvaging of the Pulaski wreckage. She's completely transformed from the beginning of the book.
This is easily one of my favorite books that I've read so far this year. I listened both to the audiobook, which had great narrators, as well as reading the ebook when I couldn't listen to the audiobook (at work and out and about) and it was a real struggle to put down. It left me wanting to know more about the real life survivors of the Pulaski and their accounts, and the author even has resources on her website and at the end of the book should readers want to learn more.
My Rating:
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟
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