Jo Harper, een erg succesvolle jonge journaliste, heeft slechts haar tweejarig zoontje als tastbare en zeer geliefde herinnering aan haar relatie met Douglas overgehouden. Wanneer Sam zeer ernstig ziek wordt, is er niet veel hoop voor hem: alleen een beenmergtransplantatie met als donor zijn volwassen halfbroer John zal hem kunnen redden, maar John is onvindbaar...

Spoilers ahoy!

If it wasn’t for the whole sick child plot line, this would have been a very good book. I just couldn’t care about the kid or his pathetically drawn mother. Killed on their wedding day, Doug’s ‘obsession’ is taken up by his kid John. John is a real piece of work. Completely screwed up by both parents, he is unable to think for himself and when he’s largely responsible for Doug’s death, he takes off for parts unknown. To bury himself in ‘good works’ to try to atone for his actions and his hereto fucked up life.

His mother is a caricature. She is the stereotypical jealous ex-wife and smothering mother. She resented every bit of time Doug spent trying to find Franklin and his ships, even though she knew quite well what he was like before forcing him to marry her by getting pregnant with John. In the end, she helps Jo find John and the bone marrow transplant works and the brat Sam lives.

The really interesting part of the story had to do with Franklin. It is a perfectly true story that he and his two ships took off for the Arctic and were never seen or heard from again. Better than 50 other expeditions were sent behind him to search for survivors or evidence of their passing. Precious little was ever found. Their story is told through the fictional creation of Gus, a teenage boy who is the lowest on the totem pole for the voyage.

The two ships, Erebus and Terror set off with thousands of pounds of provisions, largely in cans, to discover the Northwest Passage. So arrogant are the Victorian English that they think they can do this easily. What is a little bit of ice and snow to the greatest colonizing nation on earth? Pah. With 3 years of supplies they leave. And they are never found. No one lives.

Such harsh conditions I’ve never heard of before. The temperature alone would have killed most people, but then there was the ice and the general lack of cleanliness or suitable food. The theory goes that the canned meat and other provisions were improperly canned and spoiled inside causing rampant botulism. The cans that were miraculously OK were soldered shut with lead.

The crew complained that they had symptoms far worse than the normal cases of scurvy that they had seen before. Officers had difficulty concentrating on any task like plotting a course or reading charts. Crewmembers were fatigued earlier and more severely than their work would have caused. Lead poisoning. Unknown at the time, but just as deadly.

Eventually, after almost 2 years locked in ice, the Erebus and the Terror were abandoned. By this time about 1/3 of the crew were dead and so was Captain Franklin. The next in command was in charge and he wanted to march some 400 miles to a more settled part of Canada. By this time, the men were severely poisoned and suffered from severe malnutrition. Scurvy was out of control. When Captain Crozier tried to suggest behaving like the native Inuits, the men scoffed at him that they had anything to learn from the ‘savages’. Crozier knew that the Inuit survived here and did quite well and that adopting their ways just might save their lives, but now it was too late for the arrogant Victorians.

Gus was the last survivor. Despite the unsanitary conditions and the deplorable food, he’d grown into a hard young man. But when he saw Crozier die before his eyes, his hero, he just lay down next to him and died too.

Another interesting bit was the story of the female Polar Bear, Swimmer. She and her cub were distracted by the ‘psychic’ echoes left by Franklin’s men. She somehow got off her normal seasonal course and was semi-stranded on the ice. She fought with a male bear who wanted to eat the weakened cub, and just when she thought she could get a break, along comes John and his boss photographer. John gets it into his head that he’d like to die by Polar Bear and approaches her. She goes for him and gets shot for her efforts to save her cub. John is unharmed. The cub is rescued.

A bit of symbolism was used in bone marrow. Bone marrow was needed to save Sam and bone marrow was what the last of Franklin’s men were reduced to. The bone marrow of those crewmen who had died before them. Crozier urges Gus to eat his marrow and push on. Gus is repulsed and even though he says he will eat of Crozier, he doesn’t. ( )

http://www.internetbookshop.it/code/9788845423055/mcgregor-elizabeth/figlio-dei-... ( )

I very much enjoyed this book.....story goes back and forth between the 1845 ill-fated Franklin expedition for the northwest passage and the modern day people studying the event. Tragedy strikes in both stories. I found the writing compelling and the story very much worth reading. ( )

This story, while it has little to do with the book description, actually was much better than I expected. It told the story of 'parents' of different times, sexes, and species all trying to find safety and salvation for their 'children.' It struck a deep cord and truly warmed my heart. ( )