The Midnight Watch (David Dyer, Hamish Hamilton)

On the night the Titanic sank, another ship, the Californian, saw her distress flares but did not respond. Her captain, Stanley Lord, denied that he was informed, testimony contradicted in the official enquiries afterwards. This carefully detailed novel alternates between the first-person account of journalist John Steadman, who suspects Lord is lying, and a third-person narrative concerning the second officer, Herbert Stone, who was on the midnight watch and saw the flares. Steadman is an alcoholic who has never recovered from the death of his infant son and is driven to seek justice for unregarded victims; Stone is portrayed as a man with romantic views of loyalty, seeking approval from a captain who only considers him with contempt. As Steadman pursues the story, Stone increasingly struggles to remember what actually happened on that tragic night. The strength of David Dyer’s debut novel is in its believable characterisation of the participants, its portrayal of the times and its even-handedness. While some inquiry scenes are drawn out, the story will hold the attention of any reader interested in either the Titanic or the vivid social history of the early 20th century.

Lindy Jones is a senior buyer and bookseller at Abbey’s Bookshop in Sydney

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