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Print: $34.70 Download: $20.63 SeaSickness is about a young doctor’s innocent journey leading to romance on a P&O liner in the early seventies. The novel is told from the perspective of a now old and ill doctor with a life time of experience behind him. It is very funny and very sad, and helps the reader to understand the realities of medicine.
Peter is an internationally recognised medical author with books published in several languages.
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Peter Tate's Blog
2007 Nov 19 I have been beavering away writing another novel. It is finished and I have started the round of agents etc. I have published a copy on Lulu and await it to correct the silly mistakes etc. It is 112,000 words which sounds a lot but could be a lot more.
Here is what it is about.
If you knew Susie.
Henry Ivan Valentine, once a suave society gynaecologist, now an old man, is eking out his last few months high up on scaffolding surrounding the ruins of Corfe Castle. He is - to his knowledge - the last man alive. He hopes there may be others. He is writing his story down as an explanation to those who might come after him, and as a means of giving some purpose to his own existence.
He structures the story round his relationship with Susie, his first and last wife. He tells it more or less chronologically beginning in a cyclone on board ship in the 60’s and ending sometime in the not too distant future. His past regularly intermingles with his present condition, both of which develop throughout the story and converge to a climax in the final chapter.
Though not initially apparent the theme of the story is sexually transmitted disease, and the development of the HIV epidemic. Our storyteller is infected by an HIV virus even before he begins his tale and the permutations and twists of human sexual behaviour are exposed with a warmth, humour and lightness of touch needed to expand on such a theme.
It is a mutation of the HIV virus that is responsible for the demise of humankind. Henry Ivan demonstrates that this is a realistic possibility, almost a probability. His medical perspective illuminates these dark corners of our understanding and throughout his reminiscences he leads us gently to become aware of the potentially disastrous consequences of our actions.
Though his own life story moves from Ship’s surgeon, to Consultant Oxford Gynaecologist, to time in Gabon, a disastrous professorship in Florida, a time as a GP in the Thames Valley and a crucial visit to Russia in the mid nineties, the number of surrounding characters he introduces are small and most are developed throughout the narrative.
The theme is consistent but the plot twists and turns in the way that a well lived life will. Most chapters contain surprises, apparently inconsequential details are - like all good stories- revealed to have been crucial and the narrative develops a grip that leaves the reader impelled to continue to the end.
2007 Mar 05 Writing books, if nothing else, stirs up old friendships. My favourite nursing sisters who I sailed with 38 years ago are now back in contact. All those years go by, the face in mirror changes drastically, and yet a summers afternoon in The Bay of Islands in 1969 seems like yesterday.
Have spent the last month fiddling with websites, first attempts now open for inspection on www.tateebooks.com.
Back much sooner this time, promise.
2006 Dec 20 This lovely book is essentially a romance told in two interwoven stories.
The main thread is about a young, inexperienced and rather innocent doctor who goes to sea in the early seventies and through his funny, tragic, romantic and even frightening experiences walks away a better doctor and wiser man.
This tale is recollected in flashbacks by the same doctor when he is near death in hospital years later and the tragedies of his own life have left him desperate to escape back to the sunnier memories of his youth.
This book manages to be genuinely funny, immensely sad, and the often somewhat improvised ship-board medicine is fascinating!
This very readable book has something in it for everyone.
Amy Sands Berks. Posted on amazon UK.
2006 Dec 20
Unexpectedly Moving, 13 Dec 2006
Reviewer: M. Barrett (UK)
A doctor reflects on his life as a ship's surgeon in the 1970s while other medics try to save his life in the present. I was expecting an amusing series of anecdotes, and enjoyed the novel mechanism the author used to explain why his memories returned so vividly and completely - the intoxicating effects of anaesthetics.
What caught me by surprise was the slowly introduced tragic tale that made those memories more than just a series of tales brought up from the vault and dusted off. There are two people dying here, and one isn't going to make it.
You can take this book two ways - an amusing "Doctor at Sea" with a dash of "House of God", or as a tale of a man's reflection on the glorious time he had as he stumbled, unknowingly, towards an ending that no-one can describe as happy.
For me it was the latter, and it left me feeling the way all good books should - moved and wanting more.
2006 Nov 24 This appeared on amazon Uk yesterday: Reviewer: John book specialist (Leeds) I have read a lot of books over the last few years and very few of them have given me as much pleasure as this one did.
It is hilarious in places and yet manages to gently keep a very touching sub narrative of tragedy in the background. You are either crying with laughter or crying with compassion all the way through this, and a novel that manages to do this effectively is worthy of a place on my favourite books shelf!!!
Well done Peter Tate! Keep writing more books please. John "book specialist" Leeds.
Well at least somebody liked it.
2006 Nov 22 This is a web site to help old shipmates get back in touch. A sort of friends united for old salts. Of course having been with P&O in the sixties many of that group see it as a club similar to Old Etonians but with more cachet. My dad was a member of Alfred Holt's Navy, or the Blue Funnell Line to you and I. He was a surgeon too on a much smaller boat called Theseus, she carried copra, a by product of the coconut trade, and he said the image that haunted him was of an unbroken rustling line of millions of copra bugs coming out of those funny upside down l shaped vents that you used to see on the old ships. he said they were indestructible, unlike Theseus who was torpedoed off the Dogger Bank in 1940.
2006 Nov 15 Being retired now it really helps to have a project. Recently I have been working on books for patients, i have turned the Doctor's communication handbook into the Patient's ch, but Judy, my wife, said it was too long and cumbersome, so then I produced a shortened version to be called The patient's Guide, but she said it was still too long. She suggestested a short version like a talk I sometimes give to the WI so I am trying to write that. Curiously it is harder to write the short version than the long one. Perhaps I will market all three as a special e bundle to start with to see if anyone is interested. Indy my Siamese cat is currently sitting on my lap giving me suggestions, every little helps.
2006 Nov 14 It is great to get copies of a newly published book. 6 copies of the Other Side of medicine arrived yesterday. This is a collection of medical essays and short stories, 3 of the stories are taken from Seasickness, smallpox on a passenger liner, a tragic tale about Huntingdon's chorea, and finally the story of the electrician from the ill fated ship, the Berge Istra. This book is aimed at the medical profession, but perhaps some will be tempted to read the novel. I see amazon is beginning to sell Seassickness which is exciting.
2006 Nov 10  It took me 20 years to write Seasickness, 5 years to write The Other Side of Medicine and 15 years to write The Doctor's Communication Handbook, though in the end the actual writing only took days for all of them. This Lulu self publishing lark however is another journey, I am learning so much, a few weeks ago the idea of designing book jackets, converting to pdf, self publicising, even writing blogs was totally foreign. At every turn i get something wrong, then do more work, get a bit more help (Lulu has been brilliant) and then the next hurdle is over and passed. Even the daunting big ones like amazon.com and its author profiles, and Google's complicated book search strategy are getting easier. It may well be that seasickness does not sell too many copies but what fun it has been to date. I am currently looking at the ezine article site with a view to submitting some key word searchable articles: another concept entirely new to me. Anyway must go, have another article to write. The big one now is website design,that is a big swallow  Be back soon. 2006 Oct 03 It's a good day have got the publicity leaflet for two books coming out in November, The Doctor's Communication Handbook, 5th edition, over 40,000 copies sold and translated into 6 languages so far, currently negotiating for the Chinese rights. There is an awful lot of books in Bejing. The Other Side of Medicine is out too, this is a collection of essays and short stories two or three of which also appear in SeaSickness as part of the overal story. Amazon are currently authenticating them via the publisher Radcliffe Medical Press. These are books for doctors but SeaSickness is a book for everyone. I have just finished The Patient's Communication Handbook and a shortened version called The Guide for Patients, but have not decided how to publish them yet, Lulu looks a good bet but it may be worth trying to market them as Ebooks first. we shall see.
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