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Fighting the Whales

by Robert Michael Ballantyne (1825-1894)

A fatherless boy joins the crew of a whaling ship in order to earn a living for himself and his mother. Beyond being a fascinating depiction of a now-alien time, occupation, and culture, it’s also a rousing adventure story. One is left with the impression that hunting and catching a whale in a sailing ship was akin to you or me being stalked, ambushed, and killed by a shoebox full of mice. (Summary by Lee.)

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• Wikipedia – Robert Michael Ballantyne
• M4B format available
• LibriVox’s Fighting the Whales Internet Archive page
• Zip file of the entire book (62 MB)
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Total running time: 2:09:06
Read by Lee Elliott

mp3 and ogg files

• 01 In Trouble, To Begin With. – 00:13:30
  [mp3@64kbps - 6.4MB]
  [mp3@128kbps - 12.9MB]
  [ogg vorbis - 6.2MB]
• 02 At Sea. – 00:14:24
  [mp3@64kbps - 6.9MB]
  [mp3@128kbps - 13.8MB]
  [ogg vorbis - 6.5MB]
• 03 Our First Battle. – 00:13:13
  [mp3@64kbps - 6.3MB]
  [mp3@128kbps - 12.7MB]
  [ogg vorbis - 6.6MB]
• 04 ‘Cutting-in the Blubber’ and ‘Trying out the Oil’. – 00:12:39
  [mp3@64kbps - 6.0MB]
  [mp3@128kbps - 12.1MB]
  [ogg vorbis - 6.3MB]
• 05 A Storm, a Man Overboard, and a Rescue. – 00:09:00
  [mp3@64kbps - 4.3MB]
  [mp3@128kbps - 8.6MB]
  [ogg vorbis - 4.3MB]
• 06 The Whale – Fighting Bulls, Etc. – 00:11:45
  [mp3@64kbps - 5.6MB]
  [mp3@128kbps - 11.2MB]
  [ogg vorbis - 5.6MB]
• 07 Tom’s Wisdom – Another Great Battle. – 00:21:06
  [mp3@64kbps - 10.1MB]
  [mp3@128kbps - 20.2MB]
  [ogg vorbis - 9.6MB]
• 08 Death on the Sea. – 00:11:10
  [mp3@64kbps - 5.3MB]
  [mp3@128kbps - 10.7MB]
  [ogg vorbis - 5.2MB]
• 09 News from Home – A Gam. – 00:17:03
  [mp3@64kbps - 8.1MB]
  [mp3@128kbps - 16.3MB]
  [ogg vorbis - 7.9MB]
• 10 Return Home. – 00:05:16
  [mp3@64kbps - 2.5MB]
  [mp3@128kbps - 5.0MB]
  [ogg vorbis - 2.4MB]

Cataloged on May 02, 2007