PositiveOutside... devastating ... The writing is straightforward but clever—Urbina packs sentences with a lot of information, but they never seem bloated. Atmospheric moments are rare but eerie and beautiful when they do appear ... Urbina’s reporting is clearly driven by a sense of responsibility to the people he meets, and the book offers a glimpse into his relationship with his subjects that isn’t visible in his newspaper articles ... These failures can make the book feel Sisyphean. No matter how relentlessly Urbina chases a scofflaw ship or an abusive captain, the sea can swallow them up ... Urbina doesn’t spend much time linking American consumers and the abuses he chronicles, but the connection is obvious ... doesn’t have an answer for how to avoid complicity in this system, but one thing is certain: abuses will keep happening as long as no one is watching.
