On September 8, 1934, only hours after the sudden death of her captain, a fire broke out in the Writing Room of the cruise liner, Morro Castle. Half an hour later, the ship was an inferno. Many people were faced with the agonizing choice of burning to death or jumping into the storm-tossed Atlantic Ocean. The Morro Castle fire was one of the most mysterious of the major disasters at sea in history and the questions, which began as the burned out hulk of the once great liner lay smoldering on the beach at Asbury Park, New Jersey, have continued down to this day. This is a carefully researched examination of a tragedy that Mr. Hicks makes a convincing argument was, in actuality, a cold-planned, fiendishly executed mass murder.
