Ed O'Loughlin. (2017). Minds of Winter. Quercus.

Ed O'Loughlin. 2017. Minds of Winter. Quercus.

Ed O'Loughlin, Minds of Winter. Quercus, 2017.

Ed O'Loughlin. Minds of Winter. Quercus, 2017.

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creators

1. • role: Author
   • fileAs: O'Loughlin, Ed
   • bioText: Ed O'Loughlin was born in Toronto and raised in Ireland. He reported from Africa for the Irish Times and other papers, and was Middle East correspondent for the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age of Melbourne. His first novel, Not Untrue and Not Unkind, was long listed for the 2009 Man Booker Prize. His second novel, Toploader, was published in 2011.
   • name: Ed O'Loughlin

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title

Minds of Winter

fullDescription

In a journey shrouded in mystery and intrigue, Sir John Franklin's 1845 campaign in search of the Northwest Passage ended in tragedy. All 129 men were lost to the ice, and nothing from the expedition was retrieved, including two rare and valuable Greenwich chronometers. When one of the chronometers appears a century and a half later in London, in pristine condition and crudely disguised as a Victorian carriage clock, new questions arise about what really happened on that expedition—and the fates of the men involved.
When Nelson Nilsson, an aimless drifter from Alberta, finds himself in Canada's Northern Territories in search of his brother, he meets Fay Morgan by chance. Fay has just arrived from London, hoping to find answers to her burning questions about her past. When they discover that their questions about their pasts and present are inextricably linked, the two will become unlikely partners as they unravel a mystery that traverses continents and centuries.
In a narrative that crosses time and space, O'Loughlin delves deep into the history of Franklin's expedition through the eyes of the explorers themselves, addressing questions that have intrigued historians and readers for centuries. What motivated these men to strike out on dangerous campaigns in search of the unknown? What was at stake for them, and for those they left behind? And when things went wrong—things that couldn't be shared—what would they do to protect themselves and their discoveries?

reviews

1. • premium: False
   • source: Booklist (Starred Review)
   • content: The novel is a tapestry of time and place, a study of human nature, and a celebration of exploration and adventure.
2. • premium: False
   • source: Publishers Weekly
   • content: A complex tale of historical intrigue about 19th-century polar explorers, the strange disappearance of Sir John Franklin's Arctic expedition in 1845, and the unexpected discovery of key evidence relating to the disappearance in 2009 . . . The historical depictions of polar explorers—the men, conditions, and horrible fates—are accurate and stunning.
3. • premium: False
   • source: -Kirkus Reviews
   • content: A tour de force juggling act of narrative legerdemain.
4. • premium: False
   • source: Library Journal (Starred Review)
   • content: Readers who delight in history and mystery mixed together will appreciate O'Loughlin's shifting drifts of reality and imagination.
5. • premium: False
   • source: Winnipeg Free Press
   • content: An exhilarating romp through the age of polar exploration.... Minds of Winter is a story of death and glory, loss and triumph, and, ultimately, the mighty power of the imagination in the face unrelenting struggle.
6. • premium: False
   • source: The Toronto Star
   • content: a richly researched fictional exploration of the history of arctic exploration
7. • premium: False
   • source: Quill and Quire
   • content: The scope is truly epic, taking us literally from pole to pole and covering 175 years of history
8. • premium: False
   • source: Ron Rash, New York Times best-selling author
   • content: Minds of Winter is a remarkable feat of imagination, empathy, and research. Past and present merge to convey the polar landscape's immense mysteries, and the lives of those voyagers compelled to seek answers in its icy expanses. Ed O'Loughlin is a skilled cartographer of both the Arctic and the human heart. What a magnificent novel.
9. • premium: False
   • source: The Sunday Times of London
   • content: O'Loughlin's novel is a hymn to human endurance. There will be few better historical novels published this year.
10. • premium: False
    • source: The Australian
    • content: For those interested in the obsessions of polar exploration, this is a compelling and suitably idiosyncratic voyage into its strange motivations.
11. • premium: False
    • source: Times Literary Supplement
    • content: Intricately structured.
12. • premium: False
    • source: Irish Mail on Sunday
    • content: A compelling and hugely ambitious novel.
13. • premium: False
    • source: Eoin McNamee, The Irish Times
    • content: Gripping . . . O'Loughlin is operating at the interstices of truth and history, of that which can be known and that which cannot . . . The final pages seem inevitable, as great endings must; the whole novel wondrous in its tone and reach.
14. • premium: False
    • source: Laura Freeman, Spectator
    • content: A book that gets you down to the marrow. The compass of Ed O'Loughlin's Minds of Winter points north by northnorth. Up and up it goes, drawn by husky dogs towards the North Pole, chillier and chillier by degrees, frostbitten, snow-blind, but determined . . . Thrilling, Boys' Own, Hornblower stuff.
15. • premium: False
    • source: Carmen's Books and Movies
    • content: Minds of Winter is an ambitious novel, sweeping in scope, about the golden age of Polar scientific exploration and the motivations behind the men who conquered the lands of everlasting winter. It also provides a historical backdrop to delve into the inner lives of some of the most renowned explorers, such as Roald Amundsen, Sir John Franklin, and Cecil Meares.
16. • premium: False
    • source: The Sunday Times of South Africa
    • content: A novel as wide and daring in its execution as its subject - centuries of mystery, horror and human courage in polar exploration. This rollicking, beautifully written tale ranges from the lost expedition of Sir John Franklin in 1845 - with its promise of British heroism mingled with hints of cannibalism - to the expeditions of Roald Amundsen both to the South Pole and the Northwest Passage, with a fascinating dose of Nazi U-boats and Cold War spying. The stories fade out, like so many lives lost in blinding snowdrifts, leaving the mysteries to echo hauntingly in readers' minds, hoping always for a little more.
17. • premium: False
    • source: Mountains on the Horizon
    • content: Author Ed O'Loughlin has masterfully drawn everything together. It takes talent to be able to plot out a mystery and to leave clues and little breadcrumbs for the readers. I would recommend this to folks who enjoy historical mysteries and multiple story lines. If you enjoy Ken Follett, this would be a great one for you. All in all a great read and a truly memorable ending.
18. • premium: False
    • source: Philip Marchand, The National Post
    • content: A haunting novel of the Arctic . . . Who knows what might emerge from those regions of the Arctic so cold and dark not even Inuit will venture there? Perhaps it is the ease by which the Arctic can kill you that gives O'Loughlin's novel its force.
19. • premium: False
    • source: The Guardian
    • content: A graceful writer.
20. • premium: False
    • source: The New York Times
    • content: Intensely evocative.
21. • premium: False
    • source: Times Literary Supplement
    • content: Eloquent and thoughtful.
22. • premium: False
    • source: Anne Enright, Booker Award-winning author of The Gathering
    • content: The most exciting first novel I have...
23. • premium: True
    • source:
    • content:

      January 9, 2017
      The third novel by O’Loughlin (Not Untrue and Not Unkind) is a complex tale of historical intrigue about 19th-century polar explorers, the strange disappearance of Sir John Franklin’s Arctic expedition in 1845, and the unexpected discovery of key evidence relating to the disappearance in 2009. When a chronometer issued to Franklin shows up in London 150 years after the expedition crudely disguised as a carriage clock, speculation about the fate of Franklin and his 129 men is reignited. In Canada’s Northwest Territory, drifter Nelson Nilsson searches for his missing brother, Bert, but meets a British woman, Fay Morgan, who is researching her grandfather’s past. Unwilling allies, Nelson and Fay look through Bert’s papers, discovering unlikely connections between their own searches and Franklin’s fate, but neither trusts the other and secrets remain hidden. O’Loughlin uses frequent historical flashbacks to trace the chronometer’s passage among polar explorers, from Franklin, Joseph Bellot, and Elisha Kane to Cecil Meares and Roald Amundsen, without clearly defining the chronometer’s provenance. Nelson and Fay’s investigation is further clouded by Bert’s apparent obsession with the real identity of Canada’s infamous cop killer Albert Johnson, “the Mad Trapper of Rat River,” and the World War II spy activities of Fay’s grandfather. The historical depictions of polar explorers—the men, conditions, and horrible fates—are accurate and stunning.

24. • premium: True
    • source:
    • content:

      February 1, 2017
      A massive, complex novel about a long-lost chronometer.In O'Loughlin's (Top Loader, 2011, etc.) acknowledgements, where he lists the prodigious amount of research that went into his novel, he describes the book as "a self-indulgent mess of cobbled-together myth and mystery." He began with a 2009 British newspaper article about the Arnold 294, a high-precision navigational chronometer that was taken on the unsuccessful 19th-century Franklin expedition to discover a Northwest passage and was believed lost but which had turned up in Britain 160 years later, converted into a carriage clock. How could this be? Like the "meshes of a net," this is the first of many narrative threads woven through O'Loughlin's labyrinthine tale. The main story involves Nelson Nilsson and his present-day search in the fierce cold and snow of the Arctic Circle for his missing geographer brother, Bert. He's soon joined by an Englishwoman, Fay Morgan, who needs help in her search for her missing grandfather, Hugh Morgan, a former apprentice to Cecil Meares, the dog handler for Scott's 1910 expedition to Antarctica. Then we're in 1841 at a festive ball being held on the decks of the expedition's two ships, the Erebus and the Terror. Set on three continents, the novel moves back and forth in time, mixing in fictional and historical figures. On this voyage, you'll encounter the explorer Roald Amundsen; the Mad Trapper of Rat River; and Jack London. Also making appearances are northern Canada's Distant Early Warning system and World War II Nazi meteorological stations in Greenland. At one point Nelson and Fay realize their separate searches are actually converging. Make a list of characters and keep it handy--maps are provided--to navigate this atmospheric, far-reaching novel. It may all be too much for some readers. A tour de force juggling act of narrative legerdemain.

      COPYRIGHT(2017) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

25. • premium: True
    • source:
    • content:

      Starred review from March 1, 2017
      

      Like ice floes in the Arctic, the pieces of O'Loughlin's (Toploader) latest novel bump and grind against one another until they merge at the finale. The main story takes place in present-day northernmost Canada, interspersed with characters, periods, and settings from the 1840s to the Cold War, and from Australia to Russia. The MacGuffin is a marine chronometer, which accompanied real-life Sir John Franklin in 1845 on his fatal search for the Northwest Passage. Neither he, the clock, nor much of the crew and ships were ever found, but somehow the timepiece ends up in a London auction house in 1999. Woven into this mystery is the present-time search of Nelson Nilsson for his missing brother, and Fay Morgan for information about her mysterious grandfather, who may have been involved in espionage. Was Hugh Morgan a disciple of Cecil Meares, an English adventurer who pops up here and there in history and this tale? The reader will move from chapter to chapter, wondering where the book is taking them and how things are connected, until, at the end, it may all be a chilly, snow-blown mirage--except for the bodies, and that clock. VERDICT Readers who delight in history and mystery mixed together will appreciate O'Loughlin's shifting drifts of reality and imagination.--W. Keith McCoy, Somerset Cty. Lib. Syst., Bridgewater, NJ

      Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

26. • premium: True
    • source:
    • content:

      Starred review from December 1, 2016
      What drives explorers? Why do they risk reputation, relationships, and lives? O'Loughlin traces the history of exploration, and the personalities of the men who were swallowed by the Arctic and never returned, beginning with Sir John Franklin's 1845 search for the Northwest Passage and ending with Roald Amundsen's fateful flight to find Airship Italia in 1928. In a parallel story set in the present, a young drifter and a woman who is officially dead pursue missing relatives, while a chronometersupposedly aboard Franklin's shipcontinues to mystify all who discover its reappearance. In addition, the story encompasses Inuit tradition and myth; misanthropes, and others slowly going crazy in close northern quarters; abandoned ships forever icebound or sunken; and the implacable leaders who found fame, but not what they sought, before vanishing into the unknown. Altogether, the novel is a tapestry of time and place, a study of human nature, and a celebration of exploration and adventure. It's a sure bet for readers who devoured Alfred Lansing's Endurance (1994) and for those who will never forget Andrea Barrett's Voyage of the Narwhal (1998). The atmosphere of frozen horror is reminiscent of Dan Simmons' The Terror (2007), and, of course, Robert Service's poetry naturally comes to mind ( The Cremation of Sam McGee ).(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)

popularity

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shortDescription

In a journey shrouded in mystery and intrigue, Sir John Franklin's 1845 campaign in search of the Northwest Passage ended in tragedy. All 129 men were lost to the ice, and nothing from the expedition was retrieved, including two rare and valuable Greenwich chronometers. When one of the chronometers appears a century and a half later in London, in pristine condition and crudely disguised as a Victorian carriage clock, new questions arise about what really happened on that expedition-and the fates of the men involved.
When Nelson Nilsson, an aimless drifter from Alberta, finds himself in Canada's Northern Territories in search of his brother, he meets Fay Morgan by chance. Fay has just arrived from London, hoping to find answers to her burning questions about her past. When they discover that their questions about their pasts and present are inextricably linked, the two will become unlikely partners as they unravel a mystery that traverses continents and centuries.
In a...

sortTitle

Minds of Winter

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awards

1. • source: Scotiabank Giller
   • value: Scotiabank Giller Prize Nominee

publisher

Quercus

bisacCodes

1. • code: FIC014000
   • description: FICTION / Historical / General
2. • code: FIC019000
   • description: Fiction / Literary
3. • code: FIC022060
   • description: Fiction / Mystery & Detective / Historical