Neptune's Fortune
The Billion-Dollar Shipwreck and the Ghosts of the Spanish Empire
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Neptune's Fortune
Narrated by:
Vikas Adam
Pre-order Now for £20.09
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Narrated by:
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Vikas Adam
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By:
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Julian Sancton
About this listen
“Splendid . . . Sancton is an expert guide through eighteenth-century European geopolitics [and] modern marine archaeology.”—The Wall Street Journal
Roger Dooley wasn’t looking for the San José. But an accidental discovery in the dusty stacks of a Spanish archive led him to the story of a lifetime, the tale of a great eighteenth-century treasure ship loaded with riches from the New World and destined for Spain. But that ship, the galleon San José, met a darker fate. It was drawn into a pitched battle with British ships of war off the coast of Cartagena, and when the smoke cleared, the San José and its bounty had disappeared into the ocean, its coordinates lost to time.
Though a diver at heart, Dooley was an unlikely candidate to find the San José. He had little in the way of serious credentials, yet his tenacity and single-minded devotion to finding and excavating the ship powered him across four decades, even as he became a man in exile from the country of his birth. As Dooley jousted with famous treasure hunters and well-funded competitors, he slowly homed in on a patch of sea that might contain a three-hundred-year-old shipwreck—or nothing at all.
Neptune's Fortune is a thrilling adventure, taking readers from great naval battles on the high seas to the sun-soaked shores that nurtured history’s most notorious treasure hunters, to the archives that held the secret keys to lost fortune on the ocean floor.
Critic reviews
“Sancton is a masterful storyteller, and he has struck gold—pun intended—with Neptune’s Fortune. Through extraordinary research across three continents and with a journalist’s eye for the telling detail, he has penned a rollicking tale of buccaneers, shady treasure hunters, and sea battles both past and present. Readers are in for a rare treat.”—Scott Anderson, New York Times bestselling author of Lawrence in Arabia
“Neptune’s Fortune is a wonderful book, full of heroism, greed, piracy, sunken treasure, and adventure on the high seas. A wild, incredible story from beginning to end, with a central character straight out of Hemingway, it’s even more remarkable because it’s true.”—Eric Schlosser, New York Times bestselling author of Chew on This and Fast Food Nation
“Neptune’s Fortune is about treasure and the subculture of treasure seekers, but more importantly it reminds us of the deeper and more satisfying riches that come embedded within a splendid historical tale that’s been researched meticulously and told exceptionally well.”—Hampton Sides, New York Times bestselling author of The Wide Wide Sea
“Neptune’s Fortune is a real-life drama, a maritime riddle, a swashbuckling adventure, and, above all, a riveting tale.”—Susan Casey, New York Times bestselling author of The Underworld
“Roaring with excitement, Neptune’s Fortune is a deeply reported adventure, a study in obsession, and a thoroughly engrossing read. Sancton writes in the fine tradition of great narrative nonfiction that transports the reader into private worlds and into marvelous larger-than-life characters.”—Susan Orlean, bestselling author of The Orchid Thief and The Library Book
“[A] thrilling maritime saga . . . technically complex [and] nail-biting . . . [Neptune’s Fortune] is a rollicking historical mystery and a beguiling human drama rolled into one.”—Publishers Weekly, starred review
“[G]ripping . . . Sancton navigates the fraught tensions among archaeologists, governments, private salvors, and Indigenous groups with nuance and clarity. This is more than a treasure-hunt tale; it’s also a compelling examination of history, ethics, and obsession beneath the waves.”—Library Journal, starred review
“A rousing historical treasure hunt.”—Kirkus Reviews
“[A] riveting, nonfiction tale of sunken treasure worth unimaginable sums that reads like fiction.”—Booklist
“Neptune’s Fortune is a wonderful book, full of heroism, greed, piracy, sunken treasure, and adventure on the high seas. A wild, incredible story from beginning to end, with a central character straight out of Hemingway, it’s even more remarkable because it’s true.”—Eric Schlosser, New York Times bestselling author of Chew on This and Fast Food Nation
“Neptune’s Fortune is about treasure and the subculture of treasure seekers, but more importantly it reminds us of the deeper and more satisfying riches that come embedded within a splendid historical tale that’s been researched meticulously and told exceptionally well.”—Hampton Sides, New York Times bestselling author of The Wide Wide Sea
“Neptune’s Fortune is a real-life drama, a maritime riddle, a swashbuckling adventure, and, above all, a riveting tale.”—Susan Casey, New York Times bestselling author of The Underworld
“Roaring with excitement, Neptune’s Fortune is a deeply reported adventure, a study in obsession, and a thoroughly engrossing read. Sancton writes in the fine tradition of great narrative nonfiction that transports the reader into private worlds and into marvelous larger-than-life characters.”—Susan Orlean, bestselling author of The Orchid Thief and The Library Book
“[A] thrilling maritime saga . . . technically complex [and] nail-biting . . . [Neptune’s Fortune] is a rollicking historical mystery and a beguiling human drama rolled into one.”—Publishers Weekly, starred review
“[G]ripping . . . Sancton navigates the fraught tensions among archaeologists, governments, private salvors, and Indigenous groups with nuance and clarity. This is more than a treasure-hunt tale; it’s also a compelling examination of history, ethics, and obsession beneath the waves.”—Library Journal, starred review
“A rousing historical treasure hunt.”—Kirkus Reviews
“[A] riveting, nonfiction tale of sunken treasure worth unimaginable sums that reads like fiction.”—Booklist
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