On Board
A "ship of fools" indeed: madcap teenagers, a lush head of security, a priest who loves riddles, a captain off death-row, a martial artist challenging a boxer — and a serial killer. Come on board for the cruise of a lifetime.
The captain of a cruise ship, saved from death-row by Martin, goes to search for him, with the aid of the ship’s priest, who has a touch of the other-worldliness. They find Martin in a dark lane: a derelict.
The captain takes him on board and makes him head of security in the hope of giving him dignity, a seeding – in a normally futile attempt – to wean him off his alcoholism.
The captain organises for Martin’s family – wife Francine and daughter Petra – to be on board in the hope of reuniting the family after nearly a year’s estrangement.
When a girl is raped-and-killed on board, Martin comes alive to the task of finding the murderer, whom he believes has all the signs of a serial killer in the making.
There are many suspects. There is too the fear of a second killing.
Meanwhile, a group of teenagers seeks romance and adventure.
The priest tries to tell truths about certain passengers by giving them riddles to work out that may lead to self-discovery.
A teenage karate expert is determined to challenge a young boxer on his way to America to fight for the world middleweight title, unaware of the boxer's violent history.
In a Poirot-like dénouement, Martin gathers the suspects and explains his efforts in finding the killer before naming him.
There is the promise of a sequel. In the last scene, Petra proclaims to her father they should go to Florida and resume the search for the serial killer responsible for wiping out three single-parent families.
On Board caters to many demographic groups and serves several genres. It has the promise of being a huge commercial success should it be made into a film.
LATEST NEWS. Today (7 January 2025), I have completed a thorough revision of On Board. Wow, some 50 outright errors have been spotted and corrected. Many stilted action / descriptive paragraphs have been rewritten. Dialogue has been fine-tuned. The result: reading On Board will be smoother as there will be less jarring due to encountering errors, stilted / ambiguous action paragraphs and bloated / unflowing dialogue.
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