This "Budget Book" offers four full-length stories in one volume...

Clear for Action by Stephen Meader (copyright 1940) Clear for Action tells of American sailing at the beginning of the War of 1812. Jeff Robbins is a young sailor from Maine, taking his first voyage aboard a cargo schooner bound for the Carribean. All aboard are nervous about being overtaken by British vessels who have been intercepting ships, blocking harbors and making trouble all along the Atlantic Coast. Jeff's world is turned upside down when their schooner is apprehended and he and several of his shipmates are forced into service on a British frigate. Clear for Action is an interesting and worthwhile adventure story that provides all kinds of insightful angles on the War of 1812 and offers a unique contrast to very-British Midshipman Quinn collection. The story wraps up amidst interesting plot-twists – a deserted island, buried treasure and big plans.

Reviewed 4-29-02

Whaler Round the Horn by Stephen Meader (copyright 1950)

Stephen Meader's "whaling yarn" brings to life the exciting and dangerous adventures of a New England whaleboat sailing all the way around Cape Horn (at the tip of South America) to the Pacific Ocean. Young Rodney Glenn, an orphan from New Hampshire, has always wanted to be a whaler, and we follow him aboard his first time at sea. Everything is new and exciting to his young eyes and young people of today will readily relate to his adventures.

Historically speaking, it's nice to find a story that gives an honest look at the interesting but sometimes ugly world of whaling without the politically correct shock and contempt with which whalers of the past are generally treated today. This was uniquely important to me in that one of my great-great-great grandfathers was a Portuguese whaler from the Azores. The first time I told my daughter about this ancestor (who was also a third order Carmelite) she reacted with disgust, given her great interest in whales and the number of books and shows on whales she had eagerly digested.

In addition to the whale theme which contains undercurrents of Moby Dick, 19th Century Hawaii provides a unique contrast with the home port in New England and the main character's adventures through massive storms (the Perfect Storm has little on this), harrowing escapes from the "jaws of death" and adventures on a deserted stretch of one of the Hawaiian Islands make for a memorable and engaging story.

Reviews of the other two stories in the Budget Book Cleared for Action by Stephen Meader will be forthcoming.

This is a sweet, but challenging story about a 16 year old girl from pro-Confederate Maryland who marries a Union soldier from Connecticut just after the Civil War. The story presents the conflicts of hard feelings and the need for healing between North and South in the context of family relationships. It seems quite unusual as stories usually lead up to an unknown "happily ever after." Here, the emphasis is on this young bride's married life. Cultural and religious differences as well as bitterness from the war make life quite difficult for this young bride living with her husband on his parents' farm. The story makes an interesting backdrop to consider ideas about developing relationships, the give-and-take necessary in marriage and the idea of love and commitment. Appropriate for ages 12 and up.

Set in aristocratic England of the late 19th century, this novel by a convert to Catholicism explores the concept of our participation in the Atonement. Young Sir Nevill Fanning is thoughtlessly and unconsciously pagan (though outwardly Catholic) and heir to his dear Aunt Ann's estate. Early on, he falls in love with a Protestant, and this raises various issues both within his aunt and within himself. A Mr. Morpeth represents the holiness and wisdom of the Church as Nevill and Ann work out their salvation.

The novel is at once a profound explanation and touching portrayal of intercessory prayer and atoning suffering, using the unique idiom of the novel, in which the author can create and then unfold an entire cast of characters. Psychological insights and matters of spiritual growth are magnified and clarified in the lens of story. For various reasons, I have recently read a lot of Jane Austen and Charlotte Bronte, and it is all the more interesting to enter into an English countryside world not too far removed from theirs in place or time, but very much removed in theological reach.

It would have been helpful if the publishers had included a table of contents. Several striking passages proved very hard to relocate. There is an extraordinarily sweet and insightful passage about people who see little "signs" in various things. (See Book 2, chapter V, section IV, or, page 261) Even the first passage about initiation, a thoughtful reflection on the difference between those who have come to accept what happens and those who have not, is very hard to find. It's on page 71, and it is clearly the prologue to the interior substance of the story.