Whalefall

A Novel

By: Daniel Kraus

Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne

Length: 8 hrs and 9 mins

Publisher's summary

A USA TODAY BESTSELLER
Named a Best Book of 2023 by Book Riot, Shelf Awareness, and NPR

The Martian meets 127 Hours in this “astoundingly great” (Gillian Flynn, #1 New York Times bestselling author) and scientifically accurate thriller about a scuba diver who’s been swallowed by an eighty-foot, sixty-ton sperm whale and has only one hour to escape before his oxygen runs out.

Jay Gardiner has given himself a fool’s errand—to find the remains of his deceased father in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Monastery Beach. He knows it’s a long shot, but Jay feels it’s the only way for him to lift the weight of guilt he has carried since his dad’s death by suicide the previous year.

The dive begins well enough, but the sudden appearance of a giant squid puts Jay in very real jeopardy, made infinitely worse by the arrival of a sperm whale looking to feed. Suddenly, Jay is caught in the squid’s tentacles and drawn into the whale’s mouth where he is pulled into the first of its four stomachs. He quickly realizes he has only one hour before his oxygen tanks run out—one hour to defeat his demons and escape the belly of a whale.

Suspenseful and cinematic, Whalefall is an “powerfully humane” (Owen King, New York Times bestselling author) thriller about a young man who has given up on life…only to find a reason to live in the most dangerous and unlikely of places.

©2023 Daniel Kraus (P)2023 Simon & Schuster Audio

This is not an action story!

This is a haunting story about death, mourning, and family and it's devastatingly beautiful. Best story of the year for me, so far, and one of my top 10 of all time. The comparison to The Martin sets you up for an optimistic and fun story of survival and that's just not what this is. You'll find yourself fighting tears more than biting your nails.

Some folks didn't like the narrator but I thought Kirby was excellent and I look forward to experiencing more that he's done. Additionally, some people found the flashbacks to bring a weird rhythm, but the pacing and structure made me think of Arrival by Ted Chiang.

Overall, I'm sad I can only experience this for the first time once. Great read.

Mind bending adventure

This was an adventure into a world few of us have experienced. Totally grabs the reader and inserts them into another world and dimension. The possibility of escape keeps you on your toes!

Slow start but it gets better

I read this with my a book club. I thought it took to get to the inciting incident.

...OH! It's Trauma!!

I really liked how extremely well researched the whale anatomy and facts of diving and physics of pressure were. That part was deeply impressive. I also thought it was an interesting nuance to have a hardcore environmentalist be the toxic, unavailable father instead him being ANOTHER fisherman stereotype.

Beyond that almost any time the story delves into Jay's past my brain kind of shuts off until we're back in the guts. I get that is some people's bag, and some people will say "Wow, I relate so much!" I'm good, thanks. But, our narrator did an excellent job vocalizing each character, and the "BOHM BOHM!!" of the Whale Heart was very pronounced.

Oh, and overall making a sort of Cosmic Horror level experience of being eaten alive by a being you can scarcely comprehend the scope of was very well done here. I just didn't care for it obviously trying to shove it through as a metaphor for overcoming trauma. Felt very forced that the only reason this kid got swallowed was so it could function as a metaphor. If it was more subtle, maybe it would have worked better, but it was very forced.

also, Beaky MVP.

moving, visceral and unsettling

the uniqueness of the story, and the unsettling setting and mental circumstance of the main character really made this book one that I couldnt stop listening to til the end.

Claustrophobic and Suspenseful!

I loved this story so much! The use of descriptive language and flashbacks really had me hooked.

Fantastic narration and a completely original thriller

Action, suspense, emotion, and a surprising amount of credible science on top of it all. A great listening experience to share. I’d love to own the physical book as well to re-read certain passages. P.S. if you’re a Steinbeck fan you appreciate the Cannery Row and marine biology references

Imagination

Read or listen, it’s quite a wonderful tale. I love it when I go into something completely new. I absolutely recommend this book!

Teen and tough dead dad memories-in a whale

Monastery bay is an amazing dive spot. Whales, squid and jellies are fascinating.
Being the son of an angry nonconformist father is a tough row to how.
Being said teen who abandons said father (and sisters and mom) makes for complicated grief after dad is dead.
Plot is a weave from there with assorted whale and sea creature facts interspersed.
Narrator was over the top frequently-as were the anatomical descriptions of injuries (hand bones all broken and fingers acid burned but able to retrieve a battery from his tight vest pocket? 2 broken legs, shredded diaphragm with multiple rib fractures standing up/swimming out of small aperture?) unlikely at best, I’ll leave that to artistic license.
I liked the concept of all lives intertwined, all births difficult, all life could feed all lives-not new thoughts but put in a new setting.
Perhaps worth a single listen, not recommended, archived.

Confounding

While I am trying to figure out what I liked about this story. which i did. I am also trying to figure out what I did not like about it.

When I first started listening, I thought this was a YA book (youg adult). written fairly simply, I believe the author has written kids' books, but looking it up, I found that this wasn't one.

The story, despite the narration - so-so , progressed from simple to interesting to engrossing. to ending up as "pretty good overall"

I also learned more about whale anatomy then I ever thought I'd ever need to know.