Book Reviews

In the Wake of Heroes: Sailing’s Greatest Stories is an apt title for this collection of excerpts from sailing adventures penned over the last century and a half. Tom Cunliffe provides a brief introdu...

Michael and Elizabeth Tanner and a friend charter a sailboat in the Pacific Northwest and enjoy a typical cruise . . . that is, until the fog closes in and a large mystery boat attacks for no apparent...

Sailing Toward Sunrise chronicles the journey of Bob and Karen Jones, recently retired, as they travel from Corpus Christi to Chesapeake Bay via the Intracoastal Waterway in Watercolors, their 21-year...

This is a thoroughly enjoyable book! Red Flags in Blue Water is about assorted calamities R.A. Bard has encountered as a commercial fisherman turned delivery skipper.  Most of his passages have procee...

This book could be called the “Bible of Bile” or perhaps “Fifty Shades of Gray and Black Water” but its real title is longer than your boat’s sanitation hose. It is The N...

Contrary to the title, this is not a book about how to anchor. This is a book on how to select and size the gear required for anxiety-free anchoring. As such, it is a great resource. Like all good eng...

Penelope is a 22-foot Marshall catboat; Down East is the Maine coast for which W.R. Cheney has a passion and Penelope Down East is an engaging collection of their adventures together. It is not a ship...

“Boredom drove me to boating.  There was little else to do…the heat was oppressive . . . the water provided the best relief from the July swelter at 17 degrees north latitude.” Linus Wilson, During a ...

This is the true story of the first transatlantic yacht race, which was the direct result of a drunken bet made at New York’s Union Club in October 1866, with the race itself taking place in mid-to-la...

Capt. Jim Stewart has been sailing for over 30 years and has been teaching boating since 2004. An employee of SailTime on Lake Michigan since 2005, he has a Merchant Marine license and is a certified ...

Michael Robertson has written the book I’ve been waiting for. It’s the book telling freelancers (sailing writers in particular) how to get their articles published. It’s the book telling fellow sailor...

Let’s face it. “The rest of us” are on a budget and have to watch how much we spend on our boats, which is why we read this magazine. Many of us have also had the grand dream of sail...

Although he died almost 40 years ago, Ray Hunt left an indelible legacy in yacht design. Hunt is now more known for the development of the Deep-Vee powerboat hull configuration, which remains today vi...

Full Disclosure: I learned about this book when Mr. Geudtner hired my wife to proofread the manuscript (tip to aspiring writers: marry an English major). The sailing questions and occasional chortles ...

What an exceptionally fine book! Looking for cruising advice and adventure? This book is for you. Want pointers on preparing your boat for going offshore? This book is for you. Planning to cross the P...

Just when you thought there was nothing new under the sun when it comes to publishing Joshua Slocum’s classic book, Sailing Alone Around the World, you’re about to be proved wrong. There are book edit...

Subtitled “How to Become a Modern Sea Gypsy and Sail Away Forever,” this is a great primer for would-be seafarers, and a fun discourse on the vagabond life. Rick and Jasna have been liveaboards for ju...

In the summer of 1998, Christopher Madsen came across Rowdy, a 59-foot Nathanael Herreshoff-designed sloop, in an Oxnard, California, boatyard. He bought her for $5,000, and thus began what would beco...

The best thing parents can do for their children these days is to unplug them from society and give them a wider and deeper perspective of the world and more meaningful ways to experience life as they...

“Being on a boat seemed to be able to offer everything that a life stuck behind a desk could not: excitement, freedom, fresh air, movement, being outdoors, using my body as well as challenging my mind...

For every great tale, there is a backstory, an explanation of events that led up to the tale, hidden from view and forgotten over time. Curiously, most nautical tales are based in some fashion on the ...

When I first glanced at the title of this book, I wondered why anyone would publish yet another volume about boat improvements, but as soon as I cracked the cover of this book I found projects that I ...

Perhaps we all hold the interface between land and sea as a special place. I certainly do. Photographer Michael Kahn clearly does as well. Michael has just released a coffee table book with scenes tak...

Duncan Wells opens his book with the friendly advice (or warning) that all sailors should be prepared for the inevitable moment when, despite their best-laid plans, they will be called upon to sail si...

For those readers who have followed Fatty for many years, you won’t be disappointed. For the newcomers to his watery wisdom, prepare yourself for a genuine original. The antithesis of polished, ...