8.2 /10 1 Votes
4.5/5 Barnes & Noble Illustrator Mark Richard Siegel | 3.7/5 Goodreads | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Sailor twain review
Sailor Twain, or The Mermaid in the Hudson is a graphic novel, written and drawn by Mark Siegel and published in 2012 by First Second Books.
Contents
Sailor twain and the mermaid
Plot summary
The story takes place in 1887 in the Hudson Valley, on the steamboat Lorelei. Sailor Twain is told in a series of flashbacks, starting with the night that Elijah Twain, the captain of the ship, finds an injured mermaid clinging to the deck. He hides the mermaid in his quarters and gives her medical care. In turn, she breaks his writer's block and inspires him to create. When in port, Twain visits with his invalid wife, Pearl; while on the Lorelei, he is a victim of the entrancing mermaid.
The owner of the Lorelei, Lafayette, begins to act strangely after his brother drowns under mysterious circumstances. A notorious ladiesman, he takes his courtship with the women who board the Lorelei very seriously. Lafayette also spends his time poring over a volume about the history of the occult in the Hudson Valley written by C.G. Beaverton. Twain notices his strange behavior, and becomes suspicious of Lafayette when the mermaid vanishes from his quarters.
Life aboard the Lorelei grows tumultuous as Lafayette and Twain search for the missing mermaid. Lafayette believes the mermaid’s song was responsible for his brother’s death and has sworn to break her spell by killing her, or by finding seven loves, as C.G. Beaverton’s book advises. Twain, driven by lust and creative frustration, tries to protect the mermaid from Lafayette.
When the reclusive Beaverton pays the Lorelei a visit in response to Lafayette’s letters, it is revealed that the author is female, and destined to be Lafayette’s seventh and truest love. The mermaid, restored to health, asks Twain to aid her in breaking a curse put on her by her father. By using a magical pendant Twain follows her to her undersea lair, only to find the shadows of the mermaid’s past victims.
On the Lorelei, Lafayette and Beaverton consummate their love, and the mermaid’s spell over him is broken. In breaking her spell, Lafayette has also denied the mermaid her chance to break the curse. The enraged mermaid allows Twain to escape, only to have the chaos aboard the Lorelei boil over, resulting in a massive explosion in the boiler rooms. Twain, Lafayette, and many of the Lorelei’s passengers are killed in a massive explosion.
The book's concludes with a series of dreamlike vignettes that, while intriguing, some readers find hard to understand.
Serialization
The book was originally serialized online from 2010 to 2012, where it received 800,000 unique visitors. Alongside installments of the book, Siegel published a companion blog, where he posted the songs, stories, maps, and other findings that comprised his research. He also hosted discussions with readers and included portraits of some of the comic’s fans in the book.
Critical reception
Sailor Twain received positive reviews from a number of publications including starred reviews from Publisher’s Weekly and Booklist, who wrote,