Elegy on the Death of Children 
 More than anything else in this impressive debut novel, I am in awe at David Dyer's skill at shaping a story. When a friend knew that I had ordered a book about the SS Californian, the ship that apparently stood by within sight of the sinking Titanic and did nothing to help, she said "Not for me; I'm Titanic-ed out." As are we all. But one of Dyer's best decisions is not to set foot on the doomed ship until the very end of the novel. He also spares us the long night's agony; within 45 pages, the great liner has sunk; the rest of the novel, until those brilliant closing pages, is aftermath and investigation. And Woodward and Bernstein said, it's not the crime but the cover-up. 
 Dyer has an even more surprising start, apparently nothing to do with the subject at hand. A young writer called John Steadman takes his wife and two young children to Venezuela, and his little boy dies. It is a gut-punch of a chapter, but it leads Steadman to his profession, as a journalist with a special interest in the deaths of children and powerless, and a knack for intuiting the human stories behind the public facts. So when the SS Californian arrives in Boston, Steadman goes aboard, expecting to find recovered bodies, but instead attends a press conference that he is convinced is covering up a bigger story. 
 Alternate chapters take us to the bridge of the SS Californian. We meet Stanley Lord, the authoritarian captain; the diffident second officer Herbert Stone, who sees himself as the loyal Starbuck in 
 Moby-Dick 
 ; Cyril Evans, the young Marconi operator with aspirations to fame; and assistant donkeyman Ernie Gill, a born revolutionary who knows what he saw and will not be cheated out of his rights. But when the ship docks, it is only Lord who speaks, and although Steadman suspects he is hiding something, he cannot pry apart the captain's clamshell. 
 In the second half of the novel, Dyer seems to be following the pattern of Herman Wouk's 
 The Caine Mutiny 
 , by shifting the focus to the two official inquiries, the first in the US Senate, the second in London. He has done his research well; new facts are teased out and cracks appear in the dam of silence, but Steadman still feels that the true human story is eluding him. And this is another of Dyer's surprises: that, whatever the official verdict, this will not be a matter of shocking revelation, but of human subtlety.* Steadman eventually writes his story, no longer as a reporter but an essayist, publishing a pamphlet entitled "Eight White Rockets," focusing on a family of nine children traveling in steerage. It is a heartbreaking, beautiful piece. With it--his Elegy on the Death of Children--David Dyer himself casts off his role as a mere repackager of historical information, and shows himself a true novelist. Bravo! 
 *Link to a helpful article: (view spoiler)[There is a long article in the online Encyclopedia Titanica, The Californian Incident: a Reality Check, by Tracy Smith, Michael H. Standart & Captain Erik D. Wood, that looks at the Californian controversy in detail. It proves with some care that even if Lord had acted immediately, his aid would not have substantially reduced the immense death toll. It also concludes that the captain acted correctly within the conventions of maritime courtesy and the instructions of his company, and that his only mistake was in how he handled the matter afterwards. Which emphasizes Dyer's astuteness in handling this, not in terms of facts or speculation, but ultimately as a human story. And how human he makes it! (hide spoiler)]