Books for your voyage

[Wansworth]

When I'm sailing, especially deliveries, I read anything but books about sailing.....

Yes even instructions on shampoo bottles

 

[capnsensible]

Yes even instructions on shampoo bottles

Don't forget the contents bit on cornflake packets.

And navigation marks revision.

 

[Poignard]

Riddle is Understandable by YM readers……Conrad is too dark

I have no difficulty understanding Conrad and Childers but I am bewildered by "Slow Horses" by Mick Herron.

Someone bought it for me for my birthday, thinking I would like it because I like Le Carre's spy novels, but I can't make head nor tail of it.

I am in a cleft stick because if I say I liked it, she will buy me more in the series. If I tell the truth, and say I hated it, I may hurt her feelings.

 

[arcot]

Watch online...Apple

 

[MisterBaxter]

Thinking about classic sailing books, Kipling's 'Captains Courageous' is superb on the details of schooner and dory cod fishing on the Grand Banks, amazingly atmospheric. And Jack London's 'Tales of the Pacific' is an extremely evocative book. Both very readable.
Among more recent books, Kevin Patterson's 'The Water Inbetween' is a very honest account of his experiences in the Pacific, very good on the dream and the reality of sailing...

 

[GHA]

Quite a few oldies on here to listen to. Enjoyed In Broken Water by Adlard Coles. And of course Slocum, both his book & biography.

Page 4 | The Mariner’s Library

 

[Frank Holden]

Anyone embarking on a long sea voyage on a small boat should take along a copy of 'The Custom of the Sea'.

 

[Bristolfashion]

I have no difficulty understanding Conrad and Childers but I am bewildered by "Slow Horses" by Mick Herron.

Someone bought it for me for my birthday, thinking I would like it because I like Le Carre's spy novels, but I can't make head nor tail of it.

I am in a cleft stick because if I say I liked it, she will buy me more in the series. If I tell the truth, and say I hated it, I may hurt her feelings.

I have to say, Jackson Lamb is a great character. I love both those books and the TV adaptation - a tour de force by Gary Oldman.

 

[JerryRhum]

I am something of an armchair sailor:

 

[Daydream believer]

Wansworth said:
Yes even instructions on shampoo bottles


Careful, You may cause distress or offence.
Some on this forum cannot use shampoo. Resorting to Mr Muscle & a J cloth instead

 

[Wansworth]

I am something of an armchair sailor:

View attachment 175910

Learn to sail ina weekend………still trying 50 years on

 

[LittleSister]

Learn to sail ina weekend………still trying 50 years on

Must try harder!

 

[tat27]

I enjoy The Marine Quarterly, try to keep one unread for annual cruising trip & for winter dreaming/planning.

 

[justanothersailboat]

Learn to sail ina weekend………still trying 50 years on

Helps to have a boat as well as the book...

 

[Wansworth]

Helps to have a boat as well as the book...

Don’t you start

 

[Buck Turgidson]

When I'm sailing, especially deliveries, I read anything but books about sailing.....

I was about to post the same thing. Last thing I need is a book about someone else sailing

 

[Bouba]

Television.....I’ve often travelled to distance places....but never to another century

 

[dancrane]

I lately bought The Last Grain Race but haven't read it yet. Loved Trustee from the Toolroom, and even went back through a couple of Arthur Ransomes I'd never read. Conrad is definitely dark. I lost my place about 100 pages in to Nostromo, then started reading An Outcast of the Islands, although the early-50s movie is such a good adaptation, I can't picture any faces except those from the film.

Riddle of the Sands is just literary mastery, every sentence.

I realised in the last five years that what most people pine for while afloat is shoreside stuff, be it comfort or convenience, unavailable at sea. Only while lapped in comfort ashore can we really relish hardships, uncertainties, discomforts and dangers we aren't experiencing.

The great thing about books - dusty stacks of them in a sunny room far from the sea, or on our screens, or read aloud on the Audible app, is their continued power to evoke sensations and awaken memories, be they awe or dread, good and ill-luck, everything we've known, loved and want to feel again.

I really think a relaxing old age surrounded by sailing books might be better than middle-aged attempts to be a boat-owner.

 

[Bouba]

The wife is a voracious reader...a book a day...and amazingly they are usually French. I used to read a lot...and I enjoy reading...my problem is that I am a slow reader...it takes me forever to get through a book. So, I tend to not bother so much

 

[Chiara’s slave]

I was about to post the same thing. Last thing I need is a book about someone else sailing

Whilst most of our reading is by kindle app, of the proper books on the shelf, only one is about sailing, that being Scientific Sailboat Racing, by Ted Wells. Still perfectly relevant after over 70 years. His aircraft are now highly valued vintage classics, but not the book.