Book Review – The Dragon in the Sea
Author: Frank Herbert
Cover Artist: Steve Youll
Publisher: Tor
Binding: Paperback
Publication Date: 2008
Published in 1956, The Dragon in the Sea is the first novel length work by Frank Herbert and the third of four novels being reissued by Tor. It first appeared in a serialized form in Astounding under the title Under Pressure. I still like that title better but there is no denying The Dragon in the Sea fits as well. The novel covers a number of themes familiar from his later works in a near future setting. I’d say this is one of Herbert’s better works, a perfect reminder of why you should look beyond Dune when reading Herbert.
The world has been embroiled in a seemingly endless war between east and west. The use of nuclear weapons has lead to the destruction of the United Kingdom, and large parts of the globe are radioactively contaminated. Oil has become a scares and very valuable commodity. The west has developed a way to steal oil from their enemy by using nuclear powered submarines and a process to drill underwater. They literally leech of the east’s oil wells and transport the oil home in a contraption called a slug, tugged by the submarine.
Until recently this technique has been very successful but the east seems to have found an effective way of countering it. Of the last twenty missions none returned. Saboteurs are suspected to be among to submarine crews and technical personal. John Ramsey, a psychologist from the Bureau of Psychology, or BuPsych, receives orders go undercover, join one of the submarine crews as an electronics officer and find the traitor among them. Not an easy job in a crew of four men, totally dependant on each other and completely cut off from the outside world. In this claustrophobic environment suspicion becomes a second nature and tempers flare easily.
The book is quite heavy on psychology, especially towards the end. The book focusses on how people deal with the extreme stress of their submarine environment and, as you may expect from a professional psychologist, Ramsey doesn’t escape these mechanisms entirely. During his time with the submarine crew survival strategies such as schizoid personality disorders, compartmentalization of one’s life and burying insecurity under religious faith show up in members of the crew. His fascination by this process would have made Ramsey loose interest in finding his saboteur if the others wouldn’t suspect him.
I was first drawn to this novel for the future Herbert describes. The idea of a world where oil is increasingly scarce is still very relevant. In fact,1956 is also the year when the peak oil theory was first proposed. A theory that recently got a good deal of attention when demand quickly outpaced production, with rapidly rising oil prices as a result. I can’t help but wonder what Herbert would have thought of this idea, or say, the 1972 Limits to Growth report. His interest in science was broad but as far as I can tell economy wasn’t a favourite of his.
While I got into this novel with expectation that weren’t met in the least, I can’t say the book disappointed me. Herbert successfully focusses on the interactions between the submarine crew and manages to create a paranoid atmosphere. Insightful internal dialogue and interesting conversations between the crew members keep the reader on his toes. Especially since Herbert switches point of view mid-conversation. A technique we’ll see in his later books as well. In a mere 260 generously spaced pages Herbert provides a lot of food for thought. This book will stay with you for quite a while after you finished it.
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