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Finding Eden: A Perilous Quest For a Safe Migrant Homeland
The MV Militobi, a German rescue ship, teeming with 600 Arab, African, and South Asian migrants, patrols the Mediterranean Sea and learns that all European ports refuse entry to asylum-seekers. Captain Anna Kruger has a decision to return immediately to the nearest port to place passengers in a detention camp for deportation or head to an uncharted island she found on an old map as a temporary solution.
Santa Inez Island is a paradise with plenty of food, water, and shelter and is already the home of hundreds of migrants. Modern-day pirates, led by Commandant Rafael Delgado, kidnap Captain Kruger and thirty female passengers as soon as they set foot on the island. The remaining ship’s crew is given one month to bring back a million Euro ransom or the hostages will be put to death!
Under the cover of darkness, First Officer Jorge Estrada, leads the crew back to mount a rescue. Unarmed and undermanned, he must persuade all three villages, segregated by Delgado’s men on the island, to join him or the rescue will fail. His challenge? All three groups believe the pirates protect them from the violence of the other villages.
Throughout this novel, Captain Kruger, Commandant Delgado, Jorge Estrada, and a cast of memorable, migrant characters inhabit a magnificent island that brims with life. Fast-paced and entertaining, Finding Eden and its complementary additions (audio clips and deleted chapters) make for an elegantly constructed and timely story of the monumental challenges facing asylum-seekers today and the people who give their lives to help them.
Santa Inez Island is a paradise with plenty of food, water, and shelter and is already the home of hundreds of migrants. Modern-day pirates, led by Commandant Rafael Delgado, kidnap Captain Kruger and thirty female passengers as soon as they set foot on the island. The remaining ship’s crew is given one month to bring back a million Euro ransom or the hostages will be put to death!
Under the cover of darkness, First Officer Jorge Estrada, leads the crew back to mount a rescue. Unarmed and undermanned, he must persuade all three villages, segregated by Delgado’s men on the island, to join him or the rescue will fail. His challenge? All three groups believe the pirates protect them from the violence of the other villages.
Throughout this novel, Captain Kruger, Commandant Delgado, Jorge Estrada, and a cast of memorable, migrant characters inhabit a magnificent island that brims with life. Fast-paced and entertaining, Finding Eden and its complementary additions (audio clips and deleted chapters) make for an elegantly constructed and timely story of the monumental challenges facing asylum-seekers today and the people who give their lives to help them.
- GenresFiction
299 pages, Kindle Edition
Published March 1, 2022
15 people are currently reading
677 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
February 22, 2023
I think the stories of migrants and immigrants and refugees need to be given a bigger stage to inform the world of the mental and physical cost of leaving everything behind and fleeing to another place.
The trauma of seeking asylum and encountering countries and people who will not and cannot help is to be as debilitating as the journey itself. The moral cost of the non-profits and the knowledge that the people helping them will be fined, imprisoned, or injured by the smugglers, pirates, and authorities is also discussed in this book.
The concept of this book addresses these ideas and more through the journeys of three ships, the MV Ralik-Ratak, the Yap Islander, and the Militobi and the refugees from Africa, Middle East, and South Asian as they converge on an uncharted island in the Atlantic.
There is a lot of info-dumping throughout the book, huge swaths of backstory interjected into the action and segues of "why did we come to this place." The author is knowledgeable and passionate and doesn't mince words or actions of what people face when they are fleeing their homeland.
I am giving this an average grade of three stars: with five stars for the concept and the passion behind the story. More books need to speak about the crisis facing the world, unfortunately, this was not that book for me.
The trauma of seeking asylum and encountering countries and people who will not and cannot help is to be as debilitating as the journey itself. The moral cost of the non-profits and the knowledge that the people helping them will be fined, imprisoned, or injured by the smugglers, pirates, and authorities is also discussed in this book.
The concept of this book addresses these ideas and more through the journeys of three ships, the MV Ralik-Ratak, the Yap Islander, and the Militobi and the refugees from Africa, Middle East, and South Asian as they converge on an uncharted island in the Atlantic.
There is a lot of info-dumping throughout the book, huge swaths of backstory interjected into the action and segues of "why did we come to this place." The author is knowledgeable and passionate and doesn't mince words or actions of what people face when they are fleeing their homeland.
I am giving this an average grade of three stars: with five stars for the concept and the passion behind the story. More books need to speak about the crisis facing the world, unfortunately, this was not that book for me.
August 28, 2025
Brad Dude’s Finding Eden transports readers to the uncharted Santa Inez Island—a place absent from modern maps, yet discovered by the resourceful Captain Anna Kruger after every Mediterranean port turns away her ship of rescued migrants. Kruger, a German freighter captain, risks everything to deliver her desperate charges to safety, relying on an ancient sea chart and her own courage. The island itself is a vibrant stage for a remarkable cast: Jorge Estrada, her steadfast Spanish officer; Ashe, a plucky African fisher boy; Lucia Santos, a cunning female pirate; Lulu, a fierce Amazon archer; Delgado, the menacing Tenerife pirate; Jay Rowal, a Pakistani freedom fighter; and Dr. Arun, a compassionate physician.
The battle for survival and freedom on Santa Inez is thrillingly inventive, with the refugees wielding bamboo machetes, water cannons, barbed wire, and acoustic beams against their pirate foes. Dude’s encyclopedic curiosity shines through, as he details everything from making coconut rope to the ingenious use of agave for fishing and African whistle-language for covert communication. Santa Inez Island quickly joins the ranks of literature’s great imagined settings—evocative and unforgettable, worthy of mention alongside Treasure Island and the Island of Dr. Moreau.
The battle for survival and freedom on Santa Inez is thrillingly inventive, with the refugees wielding bamboo machetes, water cannons, barbed wire, and acoustic beams against their pirate foes. Dude’s encyclopedic curiosity shines through, as he details everything from making coconut rope to the ingenious use of agave for fishing and African whistle-language for covert communication. Santa Inez Island quickly joins the ranks of literature’s great imagined settings—evocative and unforgettable, worthy of mention alongside Treasure Island and the Island of Dr. Moreau.
July 14, 2023
This book conveyed the perilous lives of migrants crossing the oceans of our world and the courage of those responding to their crises in rescue ships.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews