Book Review: Castaways of the Flying Dutchman
★★★☆☆ (3/5, Liked It)
My Rating: ★★★☆☆
Intro & Summary
Brian Jacques is best known for his Redwall series, but in 2001, he released the first book of a new series, which would only release three volumes before his death in 2011. That series, and its eponymous first book, was Castaways of the Flying Dutchman.
This first book sets up the conceit of the series. A boy and his dog (Ben and Ned) survive the incident that doomed the crew of the mythical Flying Dutchman. Now they are immortal and roam the world having adventures and helping those in need. But they also must follow the commands of the angel that watches over them and leave whenever they hear a bell toll. This sets up a very cool historical fiction idea that, at least in this first book, didn’t quite measure up to what it promised.
I remember liking this book when it released (I was 11), and I have all three books released in the series as signed hardbacks. I read the second book, then was busy with the later Redwall books, and others. Then Jacques passed away, and I haven’t been able to bring myself to read that third book.
I struggled with this book being very mid, to the point I wasn’t even sure how to review it. (That’s why this review didn’t go up in May like it should have.) So to make it easier on myself, I’ve combined some of the categories below.
Plot, Style & World
Castaways is set in our real world, with the only supernatural elements being Ben and Ned and their angel. We start in Copenahgen, Denmark, in the year 1620, then eventually jump to England at the end of the 19th century. During that time, sailing was a major method of transport, and of course we had the golden Age of Sail in between, which gives our main characters and their adventures a nautical bent. Jacques loved the sea and seafarers, which is also evident throughout Redwall.
Unfortunately we don’t get to see much of the world within the time skip. Only about a fifth of the book is set in the 1600s, covering Ben and Ned’s origins, as well as that of the Flying Dutchman and her cursed crew, and first coming to terms with their newly granted immortality and ability to communicate.
The entire rest of the book is spent in an English village with a rail line that’s come in, fighting the advance of industry. We hear bits and pieces about Ben and Ned’s prior adventures, all of which are major points in history, like the Battle of Trafalgar, but we don’t get to see any of that. (We jump backward in the next book, but that’s not relevant here.)
I’m not sure if Jacques didn’t have much of an idea of the rest of the story or just wanted to spend this book establishing Ben and Ned as saviours of the common folk. But I really wish this book had more of the maritime stuff in it. The village mystery is only tangentially related because one of the characters used to be a sailor, and the dead man whose land deeds they’re looking for was in the Royal Navy.
There were a couple stylistic things Jacques did that rubbed me the wrong way while reading.
First, Ben and Ned are aliases, giving themselves more modern and normal names than Nebuchadnezzar and Denmark. They first shortened these to Neb and Den before reversing both names into what they’re known as for much of the book. It’s also implied that they should keep their immortality a secret. But this isn’t because of any rule, just because no one would believe them. Which allows them to introduce themselves with their original names anyway, leading to an exchange that reads like the author is standing there poking you saying “Look! Look how clever I am!”
This sort of thing happens a few times throughout the book, and it feels entirely self-indulgent, and not in a fun way.
The second issue I had was the repetition of Ben’s “chosen-one-ness.” This was present to some extent in Redwall regarding Matthias, but I don’t remember it being so annoying. Several of the characters Ben meets in England have multiple instances, across the whole 300-ish pages we spend there, where they realise that Ben’s strange blue eyes look ancient and mysterious. It’s fine for the first meeting, where each of them realise that this kid is much more than he seems. But it keeps happening, to the same people, as if they’re just realising it for the first time.
I felt like I was being beat over the head with how special Ben is, even though I already knew because I was “there” for his origin story. And this being a book intended for a younger audience is no excuse; they would also be there for his origin story and know exactly as much about him as I did.
Characters
Ben is your typical boys’ fiction hero, at least after he survives the Dutchman and really develop into his actual character. He’s clever, brave and full of spunk. Originally mute when the story begins, as part of his immortality deal he gains the ability to speak (which is very convenient to the story and doesn’t really have any further mention) and to communicate telepathically with Ned.
Ned is the sort who pretends to be grumpy much of the time but loves people and attention. It’s actually a pretty realistic dog personality. He’s intelligent, too, demonstrating this while Ben tries to keep him hidden on the Dutchman. When he first gains the ability to speak telepathically to Ben, his dialogue is full of growls and animal sounds, almost as much as actual words. But 200 years later, his speech is clear and much more human, in contrast to other animals, who he can speak to as well even though Ben can’t.
The rest of the characters are ensemble casts.
The crew of the Flying Dutchman is realistically diverse. I’m not sure the racial stereotyping of them has aged well, though. But at least they all get names, instead of being referred to simply as “the Arab” and “the German” the entire time, like some authors would. Similar to my critique of Cornflower as a “female character as object” in Redwall, this shows Jacques’s ability and desire to write human characters. And this might get better in the other two books. (The third, Voyage of Slaves, centres around Africa, so that would be good if it does!)
The people Ben and Ned meet in England feel pretty well like people you could meet in real life, but none of them are particularly interesting or stood out to me. No doubt part of that was because Ben was the focus, both as the main protagonist and the “chosen one” of the story.
I don’t know if it was on purpose, but the fact that Ben and Ned are more interesting than the other characters, and that the other characters were “nice but forgettable people” hearkens to the conceit of the story itself. Ben and Ned always have to move on from wherever they are whenever their good work is done. After hundreds of years of doing that, I would imagine people start running together or get lost in the vast memory of the immortal characters we’re following.
Final Ratings & Conclusion
Plot: 3/5
While the mystery in the English village was intriguing, it drags on a bit. It’s also much less interesting than the maritime stuff at the beginning of the book despite taking up four times the page count.
World: 3/5
An average rating for the baseline average world (ours). Nothing spectacular or interesting went on.
Characters: 3/5
Ben and Ned are fine as boys’ fiction protagonists, but there’s nothing particularly interesting about them for me as a reader. Everyone else is pretty forgettable.
Would I Read It Again?
Probably not, actually.
I remember really liking this book when it came out, so I was increasingly disappointed in how boring it was to reread. Maybe I’ve just read a lot of better books in the 20 years since I first read this one?
I’ll probably try to read the other two books, to find out if the second book is better and to actually read the third for the first time.
My signed copies are definitely staying in my collection, though, no matter what.
Read: April 2025