The Night Ship

Product Information

Mayken hangs over the side of the bunk to see Imke’s reaction but the old woman is asleep. Pelgrom extracts his hand from Imke’s and wipes it on the blanket. He glances up at Mayken. “What?” Mayken, woken by the change in the ship’s movement, slips out of her bunk. She peers at her nursemaid. The old woman sleeps on, mouth open, breath evil, cap crooked. Rounding the ship’s flank, they see gun ports painted red. The predikant points them out to the cherub. Mayken closes her eyes and listens, to the billow of canvas and the rasp of rope and the plash of water on the hull. The ship creaks, heeling as her massive sails fill with wind. And beyond this, the ship’s own song in the accent of the forest she is made from – a whole forest of trees! In the ship’s song is the memory of branches and leaves tasting the wind. The heartbeat of the slow-growing oak, the rushing pine.

My concern was all for naught, though. Now don’t get me wrong: Kidd has done her historical research, and she’s done it well. But to my delight, still incorporated within the history of the story is her unique brand of magic and the supernatural, allowing for ghosts and a mythical sea monster to be weaved into the narrative.I listened to the audio of Jess Kidd’s “The Night Ship”. Fleur de Wit and Adam Fitzgerald narrate this story told in two different time periods: 1629 and 1989. Loss is central to both Mayken and Gil’s experience; for starters, each child has lost their mother. Discuss some of their major (and minor) losses throughout the novel and how these may have shaped them as characters.

year-old Mayken, a dutch girl from an affluent family, boards the Batavia for a months-long journey to her new home in the Dutch East Indies. What she finds aboard is a world of wonder, not only begging for exploration but also a world that puts her life in danger. Both Mayken and Gil find that cruelty, nightmares, horror and monsters can surface anywhere, anytime. There is unrest on the ship Mayken travels on and unrest on the island where Gil now lives... The Batavia. In 1629, this ship set sail to the Dutch East Indies carrying an orphan, Mayken, and her nursemaid Imke. Then tragedy strikes months after their voyage has begun.

Table of Contents

Mayken hasn’t forgotten the expression of terror Creesje was wearing when she first saw her—the fine lady being hoisted up the side of the ship like a bag of flour! Now terror has been replaced by a customary expression of dismay. As Imke puts it, she’s probably not had to wash in her own piss before. The frustration of the wait builds to the excitement of the leaving, now that her final treasure has been loaded. Twelve coin chests of considerable weight and ridiculous worth have been rowed to the ship under guard, hoisted under guard, lugged by six men apiece into the Great Cabin in the stern, and set down with a guard to watch over them at all hours.

Gil and Mayken’s stories intersect, with the novel structured in alternating chapters. Although this bifurcated architecture allows for elegant moments of mirroring across the two timelines, I also found it frustrating: as the novel nears its climax, we swap so frequently between 1629 and 1989, Mayken and Gil, that both narratives seem to lose, rather than gather, momentum. This is a shame, as the book is clearly meticulously researched, and her account of the Batavia’s foundering is among the most compelling sections. I found myself wishing we’d spent less time groping in the dark for Mayken’s Bullebak and more in the eye of the storm, among squalls and screaming timbers. Kidd is doubtless a talented writer and a skilled world-builder, but there was much in this novel I found wanting Mirroring Mayken’s life on the Batavia in many ways is that of another nine year old, Gil in 1989. Both children have recently lost their mothers and while Mayken is being taken by her nursemaid to her father in the East Indies, Gil is sent to live with his grandfather, a cray fisherman on the Abrohlos. Both are unusual children with active imaginations and have imaginary monsters lurking nearby. In Gil’s case it is the Bunyip, luring children into its waterhole and in Mayken’s case it is the Bullebak who she believes lives in the bottom of the ship. However, neither is yet aware that there are real monsters even closer who mean them real harm. Mayken's story went from grim to grimmer; whereas I always felt hope for Gil. He is lonely and bullied, his only friend a tortoise, but there is something about this boy that touched my heart. Kidd introduces magical realism with all the many links between these two children who are both facing their own monsters, named according to their own country's folklore, Mayken's Bullebak and Gil's Bunyip. Magical realism and folklore at its finest. It doesn’t always work for me but was done exceptionally well.EXCERPT: Gil stands next to her, breathing tobacco smoke and mineral air. She smokes the third rollie contemplating an area of scrub. One of the bushes is bigger, more gnarly and set apart. It's branches are hung with ribbons and beads. Around the base of the bush, children's toys are arranged. Some of the offerings look new: a yellow plastic yo-yo, a tiny red bus. Some look old and weathered: faceless dolls, faded bears. There are many books around at the moment featuring children as narrators and protagonists. But Kidd has created such delightful characters – both very different but also similar in key ways – that it is a joy to spend time with them. And what Kidd does well in The Night Ship is to give a child’s view of the world that also provides insight into the interactions of the adults around them in a way that allows the reader to understand what is going on. While there is a large body of both true and fictional works centred around the Batavia, The Night Ship provides new insights into both that benighted voyage and the isolated islands on which the survivors found themselves.