The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny, and Murder

If, like me, your idea of fun is reading stories of others going through almost unfathomable hardship, you can hardly do better than David Grann (the expert nonfiction yarnspinner behind Killers of the Flower Moon and The Lost City of Z) and the horror-filled tale of the Wager, a British warship sent to attack Spanish treasure ships on the far side of South America. First typhus, then scurvy, then a shipwreck while rounding Cape Horn, which in turn led to murder, cannibalism, mutiny, and—with the help of multiple groups of indigenous locals—the ultimate return to England of a tiny fraction of those who began the voyage. From those survivors' contradictory accounts of misery, betrayal, and survival, Grann has woven a rousing story that doubles as cautionary tale of the folly of imperialism.