Rascals in Paradise - Softcover

Michener, James A.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0449204413 ISBN 13: 9780449204412

Publisher: Fawcett, 1983

Synopsis

The successes of Mr. Michener’s ,Tales of the South Pacific and Return to Paradise showed how skilfully he cast the spell of the Pacific over his readers. It is to the Pacific that he returns in collaboration with Mr. Grove Day in Rascals in Paradise.

The authors tell the true life stories of nine men and one woman who in the last four centuries sought fame and fortune, and pursued their dreams, in the most romantic of all the world’s oceans. Rascals all, though few without redeeming qualities, they operated on so bizarre, so individual a scale that their lives assumed epic proportions, and their stories amaze as much as they thrill or horrify us.

We read of the nineteen-year-old sailor who, in pursuit of his dream of ruling an island kingdom, started a mutiny and with his own hands murdered all the officers of his ship; of the French Marquis who sent shipload after shipload of prospective settlers to a death trap island off New Guinea, having first pocketed their savings; of Bligh, of the mutiny on the Bounty fame, and of that other mutiny he had later to face when Governor of New South Wales; of Coxinga, the Chinese Pirate, who came within an ace of overthrowing the great Manchu dynasty; of Dona Isabel, "one of the supreme bitches of all time", who. set out from Callao in Peru in 1595 to win a Pacific empire for herself; of the fourteen-year-old English boy, Will Mariner, who became chief adviser to the King of the Tonga Islands; and, in modern times, of the fantastic painter on velvet who regularly once a fortnight ran amok in the capital of Tahiti.

Violent men, greedy for fame, or power, or money, these "rascals in Paradise" forma a superb portrait gallery, and the authors have done them splendid justice. This is a book for everyone who loves excitement, romance, and the pleasure of good stories well told, and in the telling Mr. Michener and Mr. Day lead us down many of history's least known and most fascinating by-ways.

About this title

From the Inside Flap

The fascinating stories of adventurous men who sailed the South Seas

Some craved power, some craved peace, others merely surrendered to fate.

Sam Comstock -- A sailor crazed by the South Sea Islands and driven to lead the ruthless mutiny. He envisioned himself a magnificent ruler -- but his dream became a nightmare.

Will Mariner -- A golden-haired youth whose ship was captured by hostile natives. He was the sole survivor and his charm turned his captor into slaves.

Captain Bligh -- Was he the infamous captain of the Bounty, the monster legend had made him? Here is the true story of Captain Bligh.

Rascals In Paradise

They searched for adventure in the most dazzling places on earth.

About the Author

James A. Michener was one of the world’s most popular writers, the author of more than forty books of fiction and nonfiction, including the Pulitzer Prize–winning Tales of the South Pacific, the bestselling novels The Source, Hawaii, Alaska, Chesapeake, Centennial, Texas, Caribbean, and Caravans, and the memoir The World Is My Home. Michener served on the advisory council to NASA and the International Broadcast Board, which oversees the Voice of America. Among dozens of awards and honors, he received America’s highest civilian award, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, in 1977, and an award from the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities in 1983 for his commitment to art in America. Michener died in 1997 at the age of ninety.
 
A. Grove Day was a prolific author, teacher, and scholar of Hawaii and the South Pacific who wrote or edited more than fifty books. Born in Philadelphia and educated at Stanford University, where he befriended John Steinbeck, Day was also one of the co-founders of Pacific Science: A Quarterly Devoted to the Biological and Physical Sciences of the Pacific Region. Many of his works, including Mark Twain’s Letters from Hawaii and Best South Sea Stories, remain local bestsellers in Hawaii. He died in 1994 at the age of eighty-nine.

Edition details

• Publisher: Fawcett
• Publication date: 1983
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0449204413
• ISBN 13: 9780449204412
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback