Pacific

Simon Winchester is the bestselling author of Atlantic, The Man Who Loved China, A Crack in the Edge of the World, Krakatoa, The Map That Changed the World, The Surgeon of Crowthorne (The Professor and the Madman), The Fracture Zone, Outposts and Korea, among many other titles. In 2006 he was awarded the OBE. He lives in western Massachusetts and New York City.

'Gripping ... This might be his best [book] yet... Like all good writers, Winchester knows that specificity is all ... stirring stuff. The variety of material is astonishing ... As all good books must, this one shifts from the long-lens to the close-up shot, and from the tragic to the absurd' Literary Review

'[Simon Winchester] is a terrific helmsman, both confident and smooth' 4*, Daily Telegraph

Praise for Simon Winchester:

'Winchester pioneered the genre of popular narrative history ... [he] understands that specificity is what counts, as it always does in writing' Sunday Telegraph

'Simon Winchester is a literary impresario ... This is a clever, engaging and original look at what would seem well-trodden historical paths; but Winchester, delightfully, breaks a fresh trail' Economist

'Winchester unfolds this epic narrative with admirable simplicity: his prose style is conversational, and crackles with strange images. He marries even-handed scholarship with a gift for storytelling, neither dumbing down nor assuming any specific knowledge in his readership. This is from start to finish an enthralling book, and one that does justice to the magnitude of its subject' Edmund Gordon, Sunday Times

'Illuminating...a] wonderful, encyclopaedic book, pinpointing key moments in the narrative of an entire ocean and our relationship to it' Philip Hoare, Sunday Telegraph