What is the merchant marine? (Honorverse version)

Here is something I wrote up for tRMN and it's promised merchant marine track.

Welcome to the Royal Manticoran Merchant Service.

The merchant marine, whether Star Empire of Manticore, Republic of Haven or of any other star nation, is a civilian industry. The ships are owned by private companies or individuals in free market societies. In places like the old People’s Republic of Haven, where the government owned every major capital intensive business, the ship’s are government owned and are operated by a civilian bureaucracy, usually associated with the Ministry of Trade or similarly named non-military agency.

The merchant marine is also known as the merchant navy, mercantile marine, merchant service and hansemarine (Andermani Empire). The people who work on the ships are referred to as merchant seaman, merchant mariners, merchant spacers and never as merchant marines.

I have the privilege to welcome you to our industry and am pleased that you have chosen to sail with us. I'm sure you know that when you choose a space going career, you become part of an established industry and vital part of the Star Empire's war effort and economy.

The Manticoran merchant marine is the single largest merchant navy in the galaxy. The hundreds of companies that own and operate the thousands of ships that fly the Manticoran flag operate a wide variety of ships, from small 100,000 ton couriers to 8 megaton freighters with a crew of 20 to 22, to passenger liners with crews of 600 and up to 5,000 passengers. We serve the carrying trade not only between the Star Empire of Manticore and other star nations, but also within the many star systems of the galaxy including the Solarian League.

Working as a merchant spacer can be exciting and enjoyable career. You can start as an trainee and work your way up via the hawsepipe or you can apply for the Royal Manticoran Merchant Marine Academy located on the Bagaduce river on Gryphon.

Games

I'm looking for games.  Specifically games that used to be played by merchant seamen, board games that emulate running a merchant ship, or computer versions of what it might be like to run a merchant trading ship.

I found one so far.  It's in beta-testing and is based upon Nathan Lowell's Trader's Tales books

https://boardgamegeek.com/article/19942703#19942703

So far I've only looked at the Board Game Geek page.

Book Review - Take the Star Road (The Maxwell Saga Book #1)

Take the Star Road was been readable.  Parts seem stilted, but not a show stopper.

It's depiction of the merchant marine shows the author's military background and lack of background in the merchant marine.

On the plus sides - he got crew sizes reasonable.  A 500 meter long, and 80 meter by 80 meter cross section with a crew of 40.  One person to a room, which is pretty normal for modern real world merchant ships.

Down sides - military ranks and terms.  The ship's bosun is a warrant officer - although so far the book hasn't said what sovereign has issued the warrant.  The regular officers are commissioned officers - again, a military term.  Merchant officers are licensed (US) or certificated (UK).  They don't hold a commision from a government. The other crew members have Navy style ranks - Spacer 3rd, Bosun's mate, etc. For a small crew the potential range of ranks is pretty wide.

The main character, Steve Maxwell is signed on as an Apprentice.  The ship he is on rarely has an apprentice, but he manages to get  berth.  I find that odd.  Real world ships sail with the minimum number of permanent crew - either they'd normally carry an apprentice or never. While a ship will sail short handed, it's not the norm.  For hundreds of years ships have carried an entry level person - it being the way new people are trained. I don't see a ship not having an apprentice for most trips, and then being willing to take one on for the story.

Historically, UK ships were required to carry at least one apprentice. For US ships it was a required number of entry level in each department.

Crewing - single cook for 40 people, but there is apparently really good cleaning automation. The cleaning automation is explicitly mentioned, so one cook is probably reasonable.

Gripping hand - uniforms. He's using the US merchant marine wreath, but it's in gold for the Bosun.  I'd expect gold to be for officers, and if the Bosun wore it, it would be in silver at best.

Book - Take the Star Road (The Maxwell Saga book #1)

New book purchased for Amazon Kindle.  It's supposed to be about a kid on a merchant space ship.  I hope to have a review up in a few days. 

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00CS52I32?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_d_detailpage_o00_

The tags I'm using

This is a post that is as much for my benefit as for any readers. I'm trying to keep my use of tags consistent and appropriate.

Merchant Navy Authors - authors of books, whether modern settings or science fiction, who worked in the merchant marine.

Merchant Navy Fiction - fictional works that are set on modern (post 1900) merchant ships, or involve merchant mariners.

Merchant Navy Bios - biographies, autobiographies and similar about the merchant marine in a non-fiction setting

Merchant Navy research - mostly links to pages that will help readers and authors understand the real world merchant marine

Science Fiction Merchant Navy research - mostly links to web sites that will help readers and authors see what other people are saying

Science Fiction Merchant Navy - works that are set, or use, or reference a science fiction merchant marine. It's also applied to authors who write books that have a science fiction merchant marine

SF merchant marine background - posts about what a person might expect to see for a science fiction merchant marine.

SF Author - an author that writes science fiction, as opposed to one who is writing modern period merchant marine fiction


Admin - posts like this one

Author - John Maddox Roberts

Past few days have been busy adjusting to US East Coast time rather than Japan time.

Today the author is John Maddox Roberts.  I've only read one of his books, but there is one of his more recent ones on my to read list.

The book that I liked was Space Angel.  On Amazon, Basic action adventure story with the characters being the crew of a small tramp starship. What rung true to me was the small crew, and some of the documents that his merchant spacers had to carry.

Metaphors for Outer Space

We are dealing with science fiction when writing about a space going merchant marine. There is of yet no space version of the merchant marine, so metaphors are useful for determining how you want things to work.

I see three primary metaphors.  First is Space is an Ocean. Second Space is Air. Third is space if boring.

Space is an Ocean
Much science fiction is written about space navies where the basic metaphor and setup for star going craft is model along navy lines as if space if an ocean.  For the merchant marine this space is an ocean  works fine if the technology supports it.  The way I see it, ships will have the look and feel of ships rather than aircraft if the voyage between planets, space stations, etc is long and requires consistent vigilance. You have to have at least one person ready to maneuver the ship at all times for the at least weeks long voyages. You see this in the Honorverse with trips in the few weeks to a few months; Chandler's John Grimes series with similar length trips; and Nathan Lowell's trip of 20 to 60 plus days.

You will have enough crew to stand a watch of 8 to 12 hours a day for weeks on end. You'll have enough other people, especially if you have passengers, to provide services like cooking and cleaning for them for weeks on end. Since this is commercial venture, the crew will be as small as possible unlike the Navy.

Space is Air
There is some science fiction where the metaphor is more like space if like air. In this case the model I see is commercial airlines.  The part of the voyage that needs a person at the controls is relatively short - probably under 12 hours. A good example of this is from Star Wars. In the original movie Hans Solo spends a short period of time getting the Millennium Falcon off the planet and into hyperspace.  Once in hyperspace there is nothing to do so him and Chewbacca can leave the cockpit and do what they want. Even a large ship might only a crew of 2 or 3 to control it, plus flight attendants to serve any passengers.

Space is Boring
In this scenario there are long periods of travel with nothing to do. The movie Alien is like this, where everybody is in suspension. Other ones might be 2001: A Space Odyssey where it's months of travel with only occasional checks and even rarer adjustments to the course.

Author - Nathan Lowell

OK, today's post is coming from Fukuko Airport in Japan.  I'm on my way home from the ship.

Today's author & series is Nathan Lowell over at Trader's Diary.
http://solarclipper.com/

He has a number of audio books out - Quarter Share, Half Share, Full Share.  I've listened to the first book in the series - Quarter Share and liked it. It's available from a variety of sources and format. http://solarclipper.com/get-the-books/   One of the formats is free from podio.

While he apparently hasn't worked in the industry, he does seemed to have done some research and applied it to how his ships work, look and feel.  The ship and crew feel like an age of sail merchant ship put into a  high tech environment rather than like a Navy ship. The ranks are bit more formal than what I've personally seen, but not so far from what I remember from National Maritime Union contracts in the 1970s.

Author - David Weber

Today's author is David Weber. His major work is the Honor Harrington / Manticore series. It's loosely based upon the Horatio Hornblower series, but set in not only the far future, but based more on technology that maps more to post US Civil War than UK Napoleonic War.

David Weber has made the merchant marine an important side issue in his books, although the main focus still remains on the Manticoran Navy. David Weber has a good grasp of the strategic and economic importance of a space going merchant marine, but his knowledge of how the real world merchant marine works and is set up, or at least how he writes about it, seems a bit odd from the viewpoint of somebody who has been working in the industry since 1979.

Amazon page for David Weber
http://www.amazon.com/David-Weber/e/B000APBAFE/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1?qid=1440071389&sr=1-1

Amazon page for his Honor Harrington series:
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=sr_nr_p_lbr_books_series_b_4?fst=as%3Aoff&rh=n%3A283155%2Cp_27%3ADavid+Weber%2Cp_lbr_one_browse-bin%3ADavid+Weber%2Cp_lbr_books_series_browse-bin%3AHonor+Harrington&bbn=283155&ie=UTF8&qid=1440071366&rnid=3275128011

The Honor Harrington series on the Baen website:
http://www.baenebooks.com/c-29-honor-harrington-series-by-david-weber.aspx

I should have more critiques of his works over the next few weeks.

Author - Brian Callison

OK, next author.

This one is Brian Callison.  He was a merchant navy officer sailing to and from Australia. He wrote 22 novels involving merchant ships.  He set his stories from WWII to the 1980s or so.

Amazon page:
http://www.amazon.com/Brian-Callison/e/B001HOVZ2A/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_2?qid=1439978469&sr=8-2

Author - A Bertram Chandler

OK, first post.  The first author I'm going to mention is A. Bertram Chandler. He was Australian merchant navy Master who wrote science fiction.

The official A Bertram Chandler website:
http://www.bertramchandler.com/default.aspx

Amazon author page:
http://www.amazon.com/Bertram-Chandler/e/B00JGJGINO/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0

Baen publishing page:
http://baen.com/author_catalog.asp?author=abchandler
Baen offers the first quarter to one-third of each book for free online in HTML format.

One of the better fan pages:
http://www.rimworlds.com/index.html
and http://www.rimworlds.com/rimworldsintro.htm