What do you think?
Rate this book
Pursuit of the Seawolf
Assigned to escort duty in the North Atlantic, the USS O'Leary, an aging, four-stack destroyer captained by Jack Meredith, is attacked by the Nazi's newest superweapon, the Seawolf. Reprint.
372 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1991
13 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 of 1 review
November 4, 2022
There are relatively few WWII naval war novels that have what Pursuit of the Seawolf quietly possesses. At the beginning of WWII, William P. Mack was a gunnery officer on board an old WWI-built destroyer (the subject of this novel), and by the end of the war he was captain of a modern-type destroyer in the Pacific. He was a career naval officer who eventually commanded the 7th Feet and was appointed the superintendent of the US Naval Academy at Annapolis. He retired at the rank of Vice Admiral. Simply put, Pursuit of the Seawolf possesses credibility.
I would characterize this novel as a time capsule that contains the lives of those that served on board destroyers in the Atlantic during WWII. At the time, destroyers were relatively small ships made quickly and en masse to deliver destruction to the U-boats that were decimating merchant shipping. They were commanded by young officers who were given something resembling autonomy in difference to their unspoken expendability. The destroyer’s crew took on the characteristics of a family, depending solely on each other in times of crisis.
This novel packages life in this setting into a complete composition. This novel possesses truth in the same way that a painting comprised of fictional elements can depict life as it was in a past moment in time. While the plot includes submarine attacks, explosions, and tragedies, this is not the point of the novel. Mack intended to impress his readers with reality. To this end, depictions of a destroyer repeatedly voyaging out on escort cruises in the Atlantic and then returning to port may not be thrilling, but it is real.
All of this makes Pursuit of the Seawolf, and Mack’s other destroyer novels, important. There are few books in this genre that originate with credibility, and keeping those books alive is well worth the effort required to read them.
I would characterize this novel as a time capsule that contains the lives of those that served on board destroyers in the Atlantic during WWII. At the time, destroyers were relatively small ships made quickly and en masse to deliver destruction to the U-boats that were decimating merchant shipping. They were commanded by young officers who were given something resembling autonomy in difference to their unspoken expendability. The destroyer’s crew took on the characteristics of a family, depending solely on each other in times of crisis.
This novel packages life in this setting into a complete composition. This novel possesses truth in the same way that a painting comprised of fictional elements can depict life as it was in a past moment in time. While the plot includes submarine attacks, explosions, and tragedies, this is not the point of the novel. Mack intended to impress his readers with reality. To this end, depictions of a destroyer repeatedly voyaging out on escort cruises in the Atlantic and then returning to port may not be thrilling, but it is real.
All of this makes Pursuit of the Seawolf, and Mack’s other destroyer novels, important. There are few books in this genre that originate with credibility, and keeping those books alive is well worth the effort required to read them.
Displaying 1 of 1 review