Longitude

[doktor at primenet.com]

Rob Haley writes:

>A similar stranger, though dressed more in earthtones than in black, uttered,
>"Read *Longitude*, by Dava Sobel" ......
>
>It's a short book. I think I can knock it off this weekend. Anyone read it?

Yeah, on the advice of someone making his way through M&D, I read it last
week and was disappointed.

It didn't have enough technical description of Harrison's innovations to
satisfy the techie in me; there were also no drawings and only the tiniest
of photos.

It didn't have enough biographical information about Harrison to make it a
good human interest story; his life's story was treated pretty
superficially.

It didn't have enough about the conflict between Harrison and Maskelyne to
make for good drama.

Although it began and ended with personal notes by the author, I didn't get
any sense of what the problem of longitude and the invention of the
chronometer meant to her.

The prose was workmanlike: good, sturdy, but nothing to rave about.

I think there probably was a good book in the subject matter, but one which
couldn't be written in 175 double-spaced pages.  As you may well gather, it
left me unsatisfied.

Not having M&D yet, I can't address the question of whether _Longitude_ is
good preparation for Tommy Boy's latest; we'll all see soon enough, won't
we?

Let me know what you think.

--Jimmy
  http://www.angelfire.com/oh/Insouciance/index.html