The Ordinary Seaman (Paperback)

~ (Author) "WHEN ESTEBAN FINALLY REACHED THE AIRPORT IN MANAGUA IT was nearly three in the morning and the airport was closed and he sat down on..." (more)
Key Phrases: Tomaso Tostado, New York, Roque Balboa (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

A voyage of the damned, albeit on a ship that never sails, is the framing concept of this powerful narrative. Fifteen desperate men lured from Central America by the promise of work aboard a freighter find themselves trapped on a rusting, rat- and roach-infested hulk without plumbing, heat or electricity, abandoned at an isolated Brooklyn pier. Placated by the promise that they will eventually be paid, the crew work for six months under horrifying conditions: half starved, filthy, sick and humiliated, they're victims of their own poverty and the chicanery of others. Goldman shapes his story through the tales?often ribald and laced with Spanish vernacular?the characters tell to make their ordeal bearable. He focuses on Esteban Gaitan, at 19 already a haunted shadow, tortured by flashbacks to his experiences as a Sandinista guerrilla and by the death in combat of his young lover. Initially, the rambling tales and discursions impede the narrative's forward movement, but gradually, the stories accumulate and resolve into a searing picture of human vulnerability and courage. When Esteban surreptitiously leaves the ship and prowls the ethnic neighborhoods of Brooklyn in search of food and succor, the story opens out and presents a fascinating picture of a corner of America as seen through unsophisticated eyes. While this is surely a saga of betrayal and exploitation, Goldman maintains a note of cautious optimism about the resourcefulness of men pushed to the brink of despair, and about the determined search for both love and new life in a difficult new land. Goldman won the Sue Kaufman Prize for first fiction for The Long Night of White Chickens. This novel, inspired by an actual incident, should establish him securely on the literary map. Author tour.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

Goldman's second novel (following Long Night of White Chickens, LJ 6/1/92) is a tightly woven tapestry of the lives of 15 Central American men brought to New York to rehabilitate an aging cargo ship and then abandoned to winter's vicissitudes by its unscrupulous owners. The story focuses on young Esteban, a former Sandinista guerrilla whose past life included a melodramatic love affair with a doomed fellow guerrilla, and Bernardo, a ne'er-do-well older waiter whose family has broken contact with him and who dreams of regaining their faith through his schemes. Marooned in Brooklyn harbor aboard their "ghost" ship, the men forage for food, stealing when necessary. Only Esteban and Bernardo escape, the former through the redeeming affections of a local manicurist, the latter in a grisly death in a Manhattan emergency room. Though the situation is not for everyone, Goldman's powerfully charged writing brilliantly limns this allegory of immigration and abandonment. For all collections.
-?Harold Augenbraum, Mercantile Lib., New York
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 400 pages
• Publisher: Grove Press (January 20, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 080213548X
• ISBN-13: 978-0802135483
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.4 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #473,572 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Civil War in El Salvador, reflections of a Brooklyn shipwrec, April 22, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Ordinary Seaman (Hardcover)

El Salvador's recent history, their civil war, should not fade away quite so quickly. It was evil. This book reflects on it through a character who is original, believable, and sorrowful. Post traumatic stress sliced open down to the exact scenes he is recalling as he steals food for the conned crew of central americans stuck on a boat that can't leave the Brooklyn Harbor. Stalled dreams, pushed off the track by war. Read it. Supposedly, it really happened. Came from a newspaper article Goldman saw. He explains it in the epilogue.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Diamond in the Rough, October 16, 2000

By	Michael Loftus "michaelloftus" (Independence, MO USA) - See all my reviews

I found this book in the remainder pile. Talk about a diamond in the rough. This is an unusual story of seamen stranded on a ship that is delayed leaving port. They are doomed to remain on-board because they have immigration problems and can't wander the streets of New York without risking being picked up by the INS. The "owners" of the ship keep them working at repairing the rusting heap until one brave seamen grows tired of the on-board squabbling and the failure of the recalcitrant owners to show up with food and even the most meager of everyday necessities. Overcoming his fear he strikes out, creating a life of his own, risking the dangers of the streets and incarceration to find love as well as food and income, most of which he returns to his crewmates, most of whom are surprised to find he is leaving the ship at night. The characters were rich and individualistic, the settings alive with texture, and the depth of writing to be envied. What a gem this book turned out to be.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Highly recommended, very tight and well written, September 17, 2002

By	OldVineZin "oldvinezin" (Napa, CA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Ordinary Seaman (Hardcover)

This is a very fine novel. The plot is tightly woven; the writing is crisp and even, sprightly, occasionally darkly humorous, and always interesting. Its characters are fascinating portraits drawn on a carefully crafted palette.

Mr. Goldman has done a truly remarkable job and this work should be widely read. His story line, the travails of a desperate group of dirt-poor Nicaraguans, is dispensed in calculated doses. I learned just enough about each helpless participant that I was always felt tuned for more information. Mr. Goldman links the civil war so carefully into his novel that it never intrudes, instead it adds constant, new dimensions. While seemingly effortless, the author's construction is beautifully coordinated.

Masterful blending of each character yields an astonishing, cleaver plot. Although Estaban appears to be the protagonist, he is always balanced and never intrudes on the whole. He acts much like the anchor line of the Urus, the ill-fated boat, which itself appears to be Mr. Goldman allegory of life. Or is this simply too much a stretch, beyond the author's intentions? I think not. Mr. Goldman succeeds where so many others fail; this is a terrific, powerful, carefully crafted, interesting novel.

At first I was distracted by the colloquial Spanish Mr. Goldman includes in dialogue and descriptions. It was a trial for my two years of college training. I soon understood many of the words, much of them if only from the situations described. In time they became actually pleasurable and added to the authenticity. I think this is a remarkable feat and the author deserves to be congratulated on his successful technique.

I do not read books to find faults. However, sometimes they appear as deficiencies that distract from the effects authors set out to achieve. In Mr. Goldman's cases there are none. This book is a fine effort and very interesting, well worth the time spent reading, and it is highly recommended.