Ice-Cold Heaven - Hardcover

His characters live and breathe, as does the book's desolate setting, which draws the reader deep into Shackleton's frigid world. There is a stunning level of technical detail - of the ship, the crew, Shackleton's place in the history of Antarctic exploration, etc - all of which does nothing to clutter or detract from the gripping narrative. Nor does the rather dreamlike language, which helps conjure the icily surreal world of the Antarctic. Even readers familiar with the historical events on which the book is based will find themselves turning pages to find out what happens next * Kirkus Reviews * Our hands get chapped while we turn the pages to follow the adventures of Merce Blackboro this young German writer delivers a hallucinatory tableau, arousing and startling * Le Figaro * Within the best tradition of the classic adventure novel; an intriguing, enthralling book based on a true story * Frankfurter Rundschau *

August 1914. While the Great War rears its head across Europe, Sir Ernest Shackleton begins a daring expedition. He aims to be the first to cross the Antarctic on foot. Together with him on his ship Endurance are 69 sled dogs, a gramophone, a bicycle and a stowaway. Hidden amidst oil skins and sea boots, 17-year-old Merce Blackboro is on his way to the South Pole. Their journey into the ice is by way of the sub-Antarctic island of South Georgia. But the Antarctic summer is short, and their passage remains resolutely closed to them. In the Weddell Sea the Endurance is trapped for months in pack ice and finds itself delivered up to an uncertain fate. An odyssey full of privations through the vastness of the south polar sea now begins for the 28 members of the expedition. Shackleton's unwavering optimism holds them together, and they are driven on by cold, hunger and their hopes of being rescued.