Away Off Shore: Nantucket Island and Its People, 1602-1890
by Nathaniel Philbrick
The history of Nantucket Island has too often been reduced to a collection of quaint legends and warmed-over whaling tales. In contrast, Nathaniel Philbrick's Away off Shore focuses on the real people (great and obscure, famous and infamous) behind one of America's most extraordinary success stories: Nantucket, the tiny island that became the whaling capital of the world.