Shipwrecks, Nigel Cawthorne
Shipwrecks, Nigel Cawthorne
List: $14.99 | Sale: $10.50
Club: $7.49

Shipwrecks
Disasters of the Deep Seas

Author: Nigel Cawthorne

Narrator: Keith Wickham

Unabridged: 6 hr 14 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 04/01/2026


Synopsis

Ships have been overwhelmed by huge waves, consumed by fires, broken apart, sunk by storms and driven onto uncharted rocks. They have collided with icebergs or other ships, been sunk by enemy torpedoes or gunfire, or run aground on unlit coastlines at night. Boilers have exploded. Magazines have ignited. Cargoes have shifted with catastrophic consequences and submarines have submerged never to come up again.
Shipwrecks selects the sinkings with the greatest loss of life, the most famous vessels, the richest treasure troves, the most archaeologically significant wreck sites and the most daring rescues. It tells the tales of the fate of the victims, the disastrous mistakes made by ships' captains and navigators, the impossible conditions faced at sea, the courage of those who survived and the audacious attempts to raise what now lies at the bottom of the sea.

About Nigel Cawthorne

Nigel Cawthorne has been a writer for nearly 30 years, writing a number of successful popular history books; Nigel Cawthorne lives in London.


Reviews

Goodreads review by J.M. on July 11, 2018

On the whole, this could've been presented better. There were also a few shipwrecks not mentioned that I would consider should have been included (the Pulaski, for one). But a good starting point for people who are interested in this.......more

Goodreads review by Jerry on February 10, 2019

3 stars for: difficulty understanding seafaring language in this book resulted in an unduly amount of effort i.e. stern, port-side, star-side, galleon, brigadier, ballast, mast, stern, bridge, keel......more

Goodreads review by Ashlee on March 10, 2025

I expected a book about the ocean to be less dry. This book has a bunch of interesting historical cases, but the author explains them in a rather uninteresting, factual way. The lack of intrigue would have been fine, if the tone of the novel was more academic. However, the book mixes both factual eve......more

Goodreads review by Peter Stahl on July 27, 2025

Great read Such bravery in the face of such terror. The sea will take Her due. Great read, I couldn't put it down. Thank you.......more

Goodreads review by Phoebe on July 21, 2023

A Good Read But Lacking Picked this up due to a new ADHD hyperfixation (ironically a few weeks prior to the Titan submersible). It's a good book, with interesting facts and stats, but found it lacking in depth. Feel like it tried to cram too much in and therefore could only spend brief amount of time......more