It's been quite a long time since I last read anything by Arthur C. Clarke. I know I read quite a few of his excellent sci-fi novels back in the 1970's including RENDEZVOUS WITH RAMA, CHILDHOOD'S END, and 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY. GHOST FROM THE GRAND BANKS has been sitting on my shelves for several years and I finally got around to it, but to me it was somewhat disappointing. The novel was written in 1990 but takes place in and prior to 2012, which is 100 years after the sinking of the Titanic. The novel is about two groups of people who are trying to raise the Titanic before the centennial date of its sinking. One group proposes to do this by actually freezing the water around the stern of the ship and raising it in a block of ice and then having on display in Japan. The other group plans on using billions of small glass balls filled with air and pumped into the prow of the boat and then taking it to Florida as an amusement attraction.
Okay, so far so good. However, the story is very disjointed and is told in small chapters which introduce the players in the novel including Roy Emerson, the inventor behind the glass microspheres; Donald and Edith Craig, mathematicians with a child prodigy who is fixated on the "Mandelbrot set"; and Jason Bradley, an older experienced master of deep sea operations.
Some of the story that leads into the attempt to raise the ship is interesting including the discussions of the Mandelbrot set (M-set). I looked this up on line and found a very interesting Youtube video which explains it quite well. However, overall I didn't think the novel was written in a clear coherent way and I thought the ending was very anti-climatic. Overall, only a mild recommendation but I did really find the M-set to be fascinating.
Okay, so far so good. However, the story is very disjointed and is told in small chapters which introduce the players in the novel including Roy Emerson, the inventor behind the glass microspheres; Donald and Edith Craig, mathematicians with a child prodigy who is fixated on the "Mandelbrot set"; and Jason Bradley, an older experienced master of deep sea operations.
Some of the story that leads into the attempt to raise the ship is interesting including the discussions of the Mandelbrot set (M-set). I looked this up on line and found a very interesting Youtube video which explains it quite well. However, overall I didn't think the novel was written in a clear coherent way and I thought the ending was very anti-climatic. Overall, only a mild recommendation but I did really find the M-set to be fascinating.
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