This book is fantastic.
The plot is pageturner and I didn’t want to put the book down.
A superb read.

What a phenomenal book. This is the fifteenth anniversary edition of the novel and having ready the introduction by Daisy Goodwin my heart broke a little bit more that Harry Thompson’s life was cut so short. I would love to have seen what other historical subjects he would have tackled. It was quite incredible to me that when I read Thompson’s afterword that only one occasion in the novel was complete fiction and that others were largely true but happened to persons other than Darwin or Fitzroy and was then relayed to them. The author kept a wonderful balance between using technical sailing terms and not overwhelming the layman reader with nautical terms. He completely brought to life the camaraderie within ships crews and it was clear to see that the Beagle’s crew were closer than most. The difference between Captain Fitzroy of the Beagle and Captain Fitzroy of London was so shocking it was pitiful. Much as I raced from page to page to the end of the novel I do think, should I reread the book again I will stop reading just before the boat arrived in Plymouth following the Darwin voyage and remember all the characters in happier times, especially the wonderful Jemmy Button.
For me the biggest theme of the book was the never ceasing argument between belief in God and the bible and science. I feel relieved as a modern Christian that this debate has settled in the 20th century to where many branches of Christianity now accept that God created science and that the Old Testament is likely to be largely allegorical. That Fitzroy had to choose between his beliefs and his friendship with Darwin was so sad. Though there were times when I could gleefully have banged their heads together and I’m sure their poor demure wives also wanted to!
The secondary theme is of Imperialism, British in the main. I felt more and more ashamed to be English the further I read on. Our treatment of indigenous people and the breathtaking arrogance in the ‘superiority of white men’ theory Is a huge blot of shame on our past. I think Fitzroy was trapped between knowing from first hand experience that this ethnic cleansing and feeling of superiority was wrong and the fact that he firmly believed in the bible and the need for all peoples ‘savage’ or otherwise to come to know the Lord. The very people he was opposed to when it came to foreign policy were the same people who shared his same fixed religious beliefs and were as opposed to Darwin’s theories as he was. Yet Darwin, whose scientific beliefs he abhorred stood on the same side as him when it came to their treatment of Fuegia, York and Jemmy and other moral issues. For a man already struggling with mental illness this must have put intolerable pressure on his oft fragile mind.
This was a huge book, in scope, scale and sheer volume but one that I devoured in a few days. I was rewarded for this by the author’s remarks as to how he created a composite scene in the novel which made me roar with laughter!!

Set between 1828 and 1865, this tells the moving story of Captain Robert Fitzroy, the brilliant young naval officer who captains the Beagle on which Darwin travels. The two young men become instant friends and intellectual companions, but Darwin's increasingly passionate challenges to the bible as the literal `word of god' creates fissures in their relationship which neither man can bridge.

This is a feat of rich and brilliant storytelling that is intelligent, gripping and ultimately very moving. Thompson paints a vivid picture of the intellectual and moral explorations that took place in the early nineteenth century, and sets it against an exciting background that takes in Victorian politics as well as giving us a vibrant and detailed picture of life aboard a Royal Navy vessel.

But for all its adventuring and intellectual energy, above all this is a lucid and colourful portrait of the two men at its centre: big, shambling, restless and curious Charles Darwin, borrowing his way casually through life, and challenging the very basis of nineteenth century thought: and the brilliant Robert Fitzroy, honourable, authoritative, charming, but with a darkness within him which even his iron will cannot control.

It is a great tribute to the author that we never take sides in the increasingly fanatical clash between these two men, and that both are rendered sympathetically. The last third or so of this book becomes increasingly moving, almost tragic, and I was truly dreading the end.