Radar and the Raft

♦ Interwoven storylines link a triumphant technological advance with a harrowing tale of survival at sea.
In a real pleaser for readers with an expansive range of interests, Lantos twines a meaty account of the invention of radar with the story of how that device came into play in rescuing a raft crowded with the survivors of an American cargo ship torpedoed weeks before by a U-boat in shark-infested waters. He traces the history of radar from 18th-century Italian anatomy professor Luigi Galvani’s experiments with twitching frog legs to the powerful detection device that gave the Allies a significant, perhaps even decisive, advantage in World War II. Lantos also tells some absorbing side stories along the way. He not only describes the development of electromagnetic theory in specific but largely non-mathematical terms, but also—drawing from eyewitness accounts of raft survivors who were Christian missionaries returning from Ivory Coast—vividly captures the perils faced by those deemed enemy foreigners, trapped in countries suddenly under Nazi control. Likewise notable are his follow-up passages on radar’s myriad offspring from microwave ovens to GPS, as well as thrilling mentions of the still-unrecovered $50 million in Congolese gold that went down with the torpedoed cargo ship. The illustrations mix old photos and documents with Marks’ watercolor views of figures in West African and nautical settings in a mishmash that somehow suits the broad range of themes and topics. The bibliography and endnotes are likewise admirable in both bulk and scope.
A rare and exhilarating mix of hard science and seagoing terror.
—Kirkus Reviews, starred review