Where It All Goes Down
Lost at Sea
Sure, it's majestic and all, but you've got to admit the sea is a little bit spooky. Like they wrote on old-timey maps of the sea: here be dragons.
Sigh. A few dragons would probably be easier to deal with than the combination of a mother's death, a father's grief, the pain of being sixteen, and a whole barrel full of existential dread. As Ben tells us when he's on a late watch:
The night grew large. It curved up over me out of the ocean. I saw strange lights. I heard voices cry out. I found myself standing quickly and peering into the invisible ocean around me. I knew it was all phantoms in my head […] (14.5)
*Shiver*
And you know what's even spookier than the sea? Being lost at sea.
In this day and age, when many people can't find their own houses without checking for directions on their phones, it's hard to get well and truly lost. But all bets are off on a boat—especially one that you can't navigate.
After Jim Byron falls overboard, his kids have no idea where they are.
The GPS is broken, and we've been drifting in the sea in an unknown direction at an unknown speed for an unknown period of time. (22.5)
Hey buddy, we're not Google Maps, but we're pretty sure you're nowhere good.
After the boat gets busted on some rocks, Ben and his brothers pack up their gear and head over to a deserted island. Life there is basically Castaway without Winston the volleyball. Even though Mother Nature has sort of thrown him a curveball, Ben can't help but appreciate the beauty of the island:
It was perfect—a wide, white curve of sand. (30.21)
Ooh. We're booking our next vacation there—although we'll make sure to get a return ticket. Even paradise gets kind of old after a while.
One thing to note: no dates or historical events pop up to help us place the story in time. The book seems more or less contemporary, though sharp-eyed readers will note the characters' use of CDs (a musical format that hasn't been used all that much since the age of dinosaurs—i.e., 2010, the book's publication date).