The novel that predicted the sinking of the Titanic, 14 years before it happened

This article has been published to coincide with Episode Four of Mashable's new podcast, Fiction Predictions. Listen here.

The sinking of the Titanic is one of the most infamous disasters of the 20th century. Almost everyone has heard of it.

What far fewer people have heard of is a short novel called Futility: The Wreck of the Titan, published by the U.S. writer Morgan Robertson. A novel that tells the story of the world's largest passenger ship, the Titan, and how it sank after hitting an iceberg.

A novel published 14 years before the Titanic sank.

In this week's episode of Fiction Predictions, we explored the parallels between Robertson's story and the real-life sinking of the Titanic -- with help from poet David Spittle and writer Daniel Mendelsohn.