Well then.

Ship of Fools author Catherine Anne Porter based the novel on her own notes taken during an actual voyage from Vera Cruz to Bremen in 1931, the year the novel is set. (She is, painfully obviously, Mrs. Treadwell he said to nobody in particular.) At the conclusion of her trip, and during her sojourn in a Germany being gripped by the strengthening forces of fear, loathing, and irrationality, she apparently ended up on a dinner date with Hermann Göring.

Jeez. Very strange lady, very strange novel.