50 Book Challenge #1: The Solitude of Thomas Cave

The year starts with a short, evocative novel about a whaler left off the coast of Greenland over the winter. Left to himself for ten months of cold and darkness as the result of a shipboard wager, the titular character becomes lost in his past. I fought briefly against the character's backstory, but upon reflection it was less cliché than realism, and any set of events, juxtaposed with the blankness of the arctic winter, would have taken on similarly melodramatic notes. Recommended for fans of the survival tale subgenre.