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The only full-length novel by Edgar Allan Poe, "The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym" was first published in 1838. It is the story of a boy from Nantucket, Arthur Gordon Pym, who stows away aboard a whaling ship, the "Grampus", with the help of his friend Augustus, the ship captain's son. Pym and Augustus experience many unexpected adventures and misfortunes at sea, including mutiny, violent storms, cannibalism, and the destruction of the ship. Eventually,...

Looking for adventure and a new life, Ishmael, the story's narrator, decides to find work on a whaling boat. On arriving at the Massachusetts harbour to begin his search, the only bed available is already half occupied by a "cannibal" named Queequeg. Although Queequeg has limited English, a friendship forms and the two men sign up for work together aboard the Pequod under the infamous Captain Ahab. Consumed by an insane rage, Captain Ahab has but...

They were the whalers of the nineteenth century, leaving home for months, nay years at a time, in search of the largest creatures of the earth. It was their job to hunt these mammoth sea dwellers for their oil and feed the trade in hopes of raising enough coin to feed their families back in port. They are the hunters of the dark sea, in search of the deadly behemoth that is their stock and trade. It is a life and death profession where even the greenest...

Fleeing the horrors of the Civil War by deserting, Brendan Kane joins the crew of the Narthex, an oddly shaped vessel, unaware that the ship's intended destination is a mythic temperate paradise in the heart of the Arctic ice.