The Forty Fathom Bank and Other Stories

PUBLISHERS WEEKLY 28 FEB 1994

One of the two initial entries in this publisher's series of novellas (see The Secrets of the Camera Obscura , below), this odd yet engaging tale involves a young man afflicted with a ``hopelessness of spirit,'' who passes himself off as a fisherman and then discovers that a bountiful catch comes at a high cost. The unnamed narrator, struggling to support his family in San Francisco in the 1940s, buys a fishing boat in hopes of eking out a living. When some local drug companies inflate the value of a shark catch because those fish have a high vitamin-A content, several local fishermen set out in search of instant fortune. The narrator strikes a Faustian bargain with Ethan May, a mysterious, aloof sailor who will allow his partner to keep only a small portion of the cash they earn. This odd couple soon make a spectacular catch, and the narrator must come to terms with his jealousy at the disparity between his take and May's. Stylistically, the moody prose recalls the atmosphere of Poe's stories; some readers, in fact, may find it derivative. But though Galloway tips off his ending a bit, readers with a bent for quirky, dark fiction will be attracted to this unique fish tale. Galloway, who died in 1990, was a former seaman who published stories in Esquire and other magazines; he wrote and privately published this novel when he was 72.