Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Unavailable
    South by Java Head
    Unavailable
    South by Java Head
    Unavailable
    South by Java Head
    Ebook376 pages6 hours

    South by Java Head

    By Alistair MacLean

    3.5/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperCollins
    Release dateSep 4, 2008
    ISBN9780007289431
    Unavailable
    South by Java Head
    Author

    Alistair MacLean

    Alistair MacLean, the son of a minister, was brought up in the Scottish Highlands. In 1941 he joined the Royal Navy. After the war he read English at Glasgow University and became a teacher. Two and a half years spent aboard a wartime cruiser gave him the background for HMS Ulysses, his remarkably successful first novel, published in 1955. He is now recognized as one of the outstanding popular writers of the 20th century, the author of 29 worldwide bestsellers, many of which have been filmed.

    Read more from Alistair Mac Lean

    Related to South by Java Head

    Related ebooks

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Hook, Line And Sinker

      Oct 18, 2018

      Hook, Line And Sinker
      4 min read

    • Article

      The Power And The Passion

      Sep 19, 2021

      The Power And The Passion
      4 min read

    • Article

      The Old Man and Death

      Jul 29, 2019

      The Old Man and Death
      1 min read

    • Article

      Perfect Prose II

      May 15, 2020

      Perfect Prose II
      4 min read

    • Article

      The Corridor Stories

      Sep 1, 2022

      The Corridor Stories
      5 min read

    • Article

      Fredericksburg’s Wounded Warriors

      Jul 11, 2023

      Fredericksburg’s Wounded Warriors
      6 min read

    • Article

      This Is Not a Defense of Poetry

      Mar 30, 2017

      The following remarks were originally delivered at the the Oslo Poesifestival 2016. A defense of poetry is a contradiction in terms. The honor to speak this evening, which I accept with great humility, though inevitably unnerving, I will use to cont

      12 min read

    • Article

      Dublin Area Rowdy Teens

      Mar 10, 2023

      Of course, later on he would tell the police and anyone who would listen that what had happened was symptomatic of a larger problem—disaffected youth, fear of stabbings, the bystander effect, the growth of unmanned train stations, the loss of conduct

      7 min read

    • Article

      Frank’s Fable

      Mar 18, 2021

      Frank’s Fable
      4 min read

    • Article

      Jude THE OBSCURE

      Jun 18, 2021

      Jude THE OBSCURE
      5 min read

    • Article

      Psalm 139

      May 13, 2022

      Are you content to engage in that most vile sin of this age—privileged disengagement—because the unprovoked atrocities being committed in Ukraine by Russians are too much to deal with? Then we are on different teams. The post Psalm 139 appeared first

      7 min read

    • Article

      Commonplace Book

      Dec 1, 2021

      The light from the full moon lent a silky, glacial sheen to the towering front of the cloud, which stretched off to the horizon in both directions. I stood transfixed as it made its way down the street toward me at a little over the town’s speed limi

      3 min read

    • Article

      Two Poems by Joseph Brodsky

      May 12, 2020

      Two Poems by Joseph Brodsky
      7 min read

    • Article

      In Search Of ...

      Apr 1, 2019

      Fifteen-year-old Tay lives on Rannoch, a distant planet covered with water, where undersea pods or living chambers provide life support for up to three people—usually two adults and one child. Tay learns that her parents are expecting another child a

      8 min read

    • Article

      The Resister

      Feb 23, 2018

      The Resister
      6 min read

    • Article

      Crossing The ‘Rubicon’

      Jul 27, 2021

      Crossing The ‘Rubicon’
      14 min read

    • Article

      Suspended States

      Aug 7, 2022

      Suspended States
      10 min read

    • Article

      Paddy's Last Lines

      Apr 3, 2024

      Eighty years ago, on 26th April 1944, the writer Patrick Leigh Fermor (1915-2011) led the daring raid to kidnap General Kreipe, the officer leading the German forces in occupied Crete. I am afraid that, nearly 70 years later, I think it was me what d

      3 min read

    • Article

      Mercy Mission

      Apr 23, 2020

      Paul Gallico 1st published 1941 (illustrated by Peter Scott 1946) Frith, a shy village girl, has brought an injured goose to the deformed and solitary Philip Rhayader who lives alone in a lighthouse on the Essex marshes. A cautious friendship has beg

      3 min read

    • Article

      The Slave Who Braved All For Love

      May 4, 2020

      The Wikipedia entry says it all: ‘Florence Barbara Maria Szász, an orphan who became a slave, explored the Nile and died a lady.’ If Hollywood had been around in the 19th century, her life would have made a blockbuster. Very few people who visited th

      4 min read

    • Article

      Fleeing Occupied Raqqa

      May 17, 2018

      Fleeing Occupied Raqqa
      4 min read

    Reviews for South by Java Head

    3.5/5

    113 ratings5 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 4/5
      This engrossing tale takes place during WWII just after the fall of Singapore to the Japanese. A motley group of evacuees strive to not only evade the enemy but also survive the elements with a traitor on board. Very good almost to the ending, which unfortunately was a tad weak. Still, it's another good story by MacLean.
    • 4/5
      Alistair Maclean’s novel “South by Java Head”. This is a very action packed story about a group of people leaving Singapore in February 1942 as the Japanese military captured it. While it is an interesting adventure story the way how everyone’s lives are entwined is somewhat unbelievable. As is the way that the enemy knows about them and interacts with them. It seems less believable that a small group could have been so targeted amongst all the thousands of people who were streaming away from Singapore at the time.
    • 3/5
      One of the last ships out of Singapore is carrying a man with critical intelligence on the Japanese --then the ship is hit. The radioman dies horribly while staying at his post. and I stopped reading, but I hope to finish it some day.
    • 4/5
      St. Bart's 2014 #9 - This nail-biting adventure from MacLean that is so chock-full of David vs. Goliath encounters between some horribly outgunned sailors and civilians at sea and the evil WWII Japanese fighting force, that it is almost exhausting to read. In fact, that is a possible reason 4 is as high as I was willing or go...it borders on too much. And there is some inherent unbelievability throughout this that also keeps my rating down. But with that all said, I did enjoy the book quite bit.....you can't help but root for the 'Davids,' especially when they have no chance to survive, and then the odds get worse....and I kept asking myself, could I have thought of that??? Anyway, fun stuff and a great read for my final book of my 2014 island vacation.
    • 5/5
      South by Java Head, a review.I was woolgathering in my library the other day and my glance fell on an old book, on the shelves for a long time it had been gathering dust and had about it a film of neglect. And such a shame for it to have been so neglected. Written by Alistair MacLean and published in 1958, the story is set in February 1942, in the immediate aftermath of the Battle of Singapore. As the British stronghold of Singapore falls to the invading Imperial Japanese Army, a mixed collection of soldiers, nurses, fleeing civilians, a small boy, and at least one spy attempt to escape the burning city aboard the Kerry Dancer, a battered freighter manned by a disreputable captain and crew. The Kerry Dancer is crippled by Japanese aircraft, and the refugees are rescued by the Viroma, a tanker also fleeing Singapore; however, the Viroma is also sunk by the Japanese, and the survivors take to open boats open sea. Led by stalwart First Officer Nicholson, they attempt to flee to safety across the South China Sea, facing death by thirst and exposure, typhoons, and pursuit by the relentless Japanese. As tension amount in the small boat, Nicholson realizes that they are equally at risk from traitors in their midst.Having spent two years in Indonesia as the Air Attache and being fortunate enough to have been brought to fluency in Bahasa Indonesia courtesy of the US State Department, the novel awakens memories. Taking part in several memorials to Indonesian intellectuals murdered by the Japanese and hearing their stories, made the events in South by Java Head very poignant.Of course one truism that can be said of Mr. MacLean’s heroes, they are typically a male character who is depicted as physically and morally indestructible. The kind of character all men aspire to. Unlike the “tainted hero” who skirts or outright flaunts a disregard for law and justice to obtain the correct outcome, MacLean’s protagonists adhere to the straight and narrow and overcome what appears to be insurmountable odds. With conversation frequently laced with a dry, sardonic, self-deprecating humour, the hero guides us on to a satisfying end.