The tale of Bermuda's discovery and colonisation has been told many times in many guises – from a dramatic production commemorating the 350th anniversary of English settlement to a brief synopsis at the front of a glossy, coffee-table picture book – so one might wonder what another retelling could add to the story.

Kieran Doherty's 'Sea Venture', published by St. Martin's Press in May 2007, fills in the background of the individuals who enter Bermuda's story fully-grown, rounding out the tale of seasoned mariners and explorers whose shipwreck on Bermuda is just one adventure in lives filled with adventure. It fleshes out the bare bones of the tale of a journey from safe harbour to treacherous reefs and unexplored territory beyond, exploring the role of the Sea Venture survivors in the establishment of the English presence in the New World, until 1609 a costly and tentative effort at best.

Placing the voyage of the Sea Venture and its companion ships in context, Mr. Doherty (pictured) gives an overview of the English exploration and exploitation of trading opportunities in North America and the earlier chance encounters of mariners of various nations with Bermuda's treacherous reefs. His account moves back and forth between the two colonies of Virginia and Bermuda, describing their parallel and mutually-dependent development into the mid 17th century.

The principal characters are described in some detail, revealing, for example, that chronicler William Stracey, aged 36 when he boarded the expedition's flagship, was so deep in debt he feared imprisonment. The Sea Venture's captain, Christopher Newport, 49 years of age in 1609, had for many years been active as a Caribbean pirate, had lost a right arm in one engagement and had already made three crossings between England and Jamestown.

Not content to shine the spotlight on the leading figures, Mr. Doherty creates a vivid image of what life was like for the common folk below decks, and fills in the back stories with information from various contemporary sources. Much about the specific voyage, due to the nature of the documentation available, must be conjecture, but details given about contemporary methods of navigation and ship construction give a better insight into how the voyagers would have spent their days in fair weather and worked frantically to remain afloat during the tempest.

He follows the Sea Venture survivors to Virginia, and describes the struggle to overcome the difficulties of terrain, hostile natives and strained supply routes stake an English claim to the wealth of resources and opportunities in the new world. He presents clearly the "mutually exclusive goals [that] guaranteed continued conflict between the two peoples and the ultimate eradication of the less technologically advanced Powhatans" and the role of individuals like John Rolfe in the Virginia colony's permanence.

"Ultimately, it was Gates and Matthew Somers and William Strachey and other survivors of the Sea Venture shipwreck who carried good news about Bermuda to England who provided the real spark needed to reignite the fire of colonialism, and a willingness to invest, among the adventurers in London and across England."

Mr. Doherty's account of Governor Moore's attempts to establish a colony on Bermuda, include the conflicts between settler and investor that began with the fortune in ambergris discovered by Edward Chard, Christopher Carter and Edward Waters. Moore's struggle to use the ambergris to the best advantage of the Colony meant finding a way of wresting from its colonist finders the fortune that technically belonged to the Virginia Company and then using it as a bargaining chip to ensure the London investors' continuing support of the colonists – a balancing act that would have tested the most skilful diplomat.

The account concludes with the final desperate attempt of the native people of the Tidewater area to resist the incursion of the English and the observation that the Virginia colony by the mid 1600s was firmly on the path to success "thanks in large part, to the men and women who took ship on the Sea Venture in 1609". Well-written in an engaging manner, Mr. Doherty's account, sub-titled "Shipwreck, survival and the salvation of the first English colony in the new world" will provide the general reader interested in this aspect of 17th century history with a fuller picture than that provided by the usual synopses. The tale of the development of the two colonies, usually told separately, is shown to be an intertwined effort. The lack of index will make it less useful for scholars as a reference work, which is disappointing, as the extensive footnotes and bibliography indicate that Mr. Doherty has done his homework. Reproductions of contemporary maps and engravings illustrate the text in a limited fashion. Insightful and balanced, it is a useful addition to the body of work on Bermuda's early history.