A novel of the sea, set in the 1890s. Harvey Cheyne is the spoiled teenage son of a rich American businessman. When he falls overboard from an ocean liner, he is picked up by a fishing schooner from Gloucester, Massachusetts, bound for the Grand Banks. The captain cannot take him home until the season ends, so Harvey must work among the crew. Through hard labour, danger and the friendship of an older fisherman and his son, he starts to learn some real values. Kipling draws on close observation of the fishing trade, and the book is both a lively adventure and a story of growing up.