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Uncharted Waters By Melissa J Wantuck  |
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 Theodore Carl Soderberg has dabbled in a little bit of everything: the navy, selling cars, acting, marriage, and now writing. His first book, Uncharted Waters, is a tail from a real-life experience doing his main gig as a seaman in the United States Merchant Marine.
Uncharted Waters is set during Desert Storm/Desert Shield from mid-1989 to early 1990. Soderberg is a crewman on the A. J. Higgins, a Navy-owned refueling tanker ship. The ship is only two years old but it already has a bad reputation of unfortunate accidents and for sailors, who are often superstitious, Soderberg and his crewmates were jumpy from the beginning in case the boat’s karma targeted one of them.
Soderberg sails on the Higgins from Japan with stops along Southeast Asia, into the Indian Ocean and finally an intended ending in the Red Sea. Along the way, there’s a storm, but its effects are only minutely mentioned so it sounds like more of a strong ocean breeze than what was really encountered, and there is an uneventful passage through pirate-infested waters. It’s hyped up, like the storm, but soon becomes another let-down from all the inactivity.
As the Higgins sails past slumbering pirates, Soderberg comes to the aid of a woman who is being hunted by the mob. Believe it or not, Blaze (yes, that’s her name) gives Soderberg a detailed account of her history that led her to escape as a cook on a navy-owned ship on the opposite side of the world from her home in New Jersey. Soderberg isn’t acquainted with anyone in the mob, but his advice to Blaze is to get off the ship as soon as she can avoid getting cornered. His wisdom is right on the mark because a mob hit man finds a way to get himself on the boat, luckily months after Blaze has departed.
Blaze’s story is one of the most interesting parts of the books but it is limited and only a segment of Soderberg’s entire experience on the Higgins. His story is also the story of the lives of fellow merchant marines. There are a number of colorful characters to make you chuckle and even wish you were a carefree sailor out there on the seas with nothing to tie you down.
Unbeknownst to the crew of the Higgins, a man named Saddam Hussein is causing problems and his actions soon brings the Higgins to the frontline of an impending war. Instead of heading into the red sea, the Higgins joins a convoy of Navy battleships patrolling the waters of the Persian Gulf during a naval blockade against Saddam Hussein.
Soderberg’s story doesn’t end how you might think, with everyone watching bombing runs, listening to machine gun fire, and hearing the booming sounds of artillery rounds. The course of the Higgins is slightly altered and before you know it, Soderberg’s tale has ended.
His storytelling capabilities are enough to keep a reader interested but he has some edges that need fine tuning before he begins his next literary adventure. The sailor’s jargon adds to the flavor but some of it needs to be defined for laymen of the seas so it is fully appreciated. Between that and his blurred timeline of events, you might find yourself lost…at sea (figuratively speaking).
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