Tag Archives: favourites

Boat Book Gift Ideas, Big and Small

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These days, the answer to the question “what is a book?” is certainly changing.  And while the Nautical Mind is on the brink of offering e-books, we definitely have some pleasing book book alternatives that are anything but standard size. If you can’t make it to our old fashioned brick’n'mortar storefront to browse, go ahead and browse our online catalogue. Perfect for Christmas stockings, purses, book bags, hand luggage – not to mention cockpits and bunks – here are a few of the best:

Poems of the Sea Sea Cards Heave Ho! The Little Book of Seasickness

Reeds Knot Handbook, new this year, is a perfect little item for pocket or bag, for anyone who’s trying to learn the ropes.  Its step-by-step photos demonstrate how to tie the most useful knots—and also show what the finished product should look like. Reeds Skipper’s Handbook is more of a quick reference, bursting as it is with the critical basics of navigation, weather, anchoring, mooring, and more. The Boater’s Pocket Reference ranges a little further while remaining compact, covering boating terms, design, construction materials, the rules of the road, seamanship, weather, engines, electronics, and even more.

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Beth Leonard and Lin and Larry Pardey’s Favourite Books

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We asked some of our favourite authors (many of whom have been part of the speaker’s series we used to run with Harbourfront), to tell us about their favourite nautical book. Here’s what some of them said:

Lin and Larry Pardey’s many co-authored books include Cruising in Seraffyn, Care and Feeding of the Sailing Crew, The Self-Sufficient Sailor, and Storm Tactics.


First You Have to Row a Small Boat

First You Have to Row a Small Boat

Lin: Someone gave me First You Have to Row a Little Boat by Richard Bode as a farewell gift when we set off from Virginia bound for Cape Horn. As we sailed south from the Cape Verde’s, Larry couldn’t get to sleep, so I decided to read to him. I picked up this book and after reading the first chapter we both decided to make this an evening ritual. We’d often discuss the chapters the next morning as we cleaned up after the night watches. Lovely comments about life lessons wrapped up in the simple art of learning to row a little boat.
Cochrane: The Real Master and Commander

Cochrane: The Real Master and Commander

Larry: Cochrane: The Real Master and Commander by David Cordingly is one of my favourites. I loved the Hornblower books, not for the blood-and-guts fighting but for the fine seamanship, excellent planning, and clever sailing tips I gleaned. To read Cochrane is to realize the exploits of Hornblower were not exaggerated but based almost completely on fact. Cochrane’s seamanship was amazing, as was his concern for the men under his command. His life was far more complicated than the fictional characters drawn from it. This book reads almost like a novel.

Beth Leonard’s books include books include Voyager’s Handbook, Blue Horizons, and Following Seas: Sailing the Globe, Sounding a Life

N by E

N by E

I read Rockwell Kent’s N by E when we were in Patagonia and was enchanted by Kent’s sparing prose and how it complimented his beautiful woodcut illustrations. Few books come so close to capturing the dream of all cruisers to go over the horizon, test oneself against the sea, and return, knowing oneself and one’s world more intimately and more completely than one ever has before. But Kent also captures the allure of high latitude cruising and depicts the indigenous Greenlanders he meets with compassion and great respect in an era when these people had not yet lost their native traditions. He gives us a glimpse of a world long since gone, but one that shares with our own the universal desire for human striving and personal betterment.

More author recommendations on the way!

More of your favourite authors’ favourite books

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We asked some of our favourite authors to tell us about their favourite nautical book. Here’s what some of them said:

Survive the Savage Sea

First You Have to Row a Small Boat

The Voyager's Handbook
It is near-impossible to identify just one of my favourites from the many I’ve accumulated over the years, so I’m listing three: Survive the Savage Sea, First You Have to Row a Little Boat, and The Voyager’s Handbook. Each book is as different as their respective authors and all have, in different ways and at different times, been enormous sources of inspiration. Thank you Nautical Mind and congratulations on your 30th anniversary.

Jimmy Cornell’s many books include World Cruising Routes, A Passion for the Sea, and the just- published World Cruising Destinations.

A Race Too Far

A Race Too Far

My favourite book is a recent publication: A Race Too Far by Chris Eakin.  It is the story of the first round-the-world race, a spell-binding tale of immense courage, heroic sacrifice, and profound despair whose reverberations are still felt by the survivors of this epic drama and whose painful memories have not been alleviated by the passing of time. The Golden Globe trophy and the considerable prize of £5,000 (approximately £100,000 in today’s money) wa offered to the first person to sail around the globe without stopping anywhere. The rules were very simple, any type of sailing boat was allowed and participants had to start between 1 June and 31 October 1968. Several participants have written their own accounts and there have been a number of books written about this unique race but none conveys better the excitement and drama of this modern odyssey than Chris Eakin, who skilfully weaves together the disparate strands of a heart-rending tale of human tragedy and redemption of Homeric dimensions.

Derek Lundy’s books include Way of a Ship: A Square-Rigger Voyage in the Last Days of Sail and Godforsaken Sea: Racing the World’s Most Dangerous Waters.

Offshore Sailing: 200 Essential Passagemaking Tips

Offshore Sailing

Here’s a few lines about a book I like very much: Offshore Sailing: 200 Essential Passagemaking Tips by Bill Seifert (, with Daniel Spurr) is a supremely useful and practical guide to getting a sailing vessel ready for an offshore passage. Seifert has vast experience and he makes each tip — from rigging a boom preventer, to providing engine space ventilation, to how to make the best time on passages, to handy offshore recipes — easy to understand and apply. Anyone planning a passage out of sight of land should refer to Seifert’s essential manual. I’’m using Seifert myself at the moment in hopes of heading out into the big blue Pacific sometime soon.

More author recommendations on the way!

More Favourite Nautical Books

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We asked some of our favourite authors (many of whom have been part of the speaker’s series we used to run with Harbourfront), to tell us about their favourite nautical book. Here’s what some of them said:

Ann Vanderhoof is the author of  An Embarassment of Mangoes
and The Spice Necklace

Windward Islands

Leeward Islands

Virgin Islands
My favourite nautical book is whatever cruising guide I happen to be reading at the moment—  because if I’m reading a cruising guide, it means I’m exploring (or dreaming about) a new destination, which is one of my favourite things to do.  I love that two different guidebooks can have such very different takes on the same place, depending on the mindset of the author. (I’ve learned the hard way that just because a guidebook provides excellent advice on getting into an anchorage safely doesn’t mean its restaurant recommendations are also to be trusted!)

I particularly love guides where the writer’s personality comes through, and he (or she) lays his biases on the table. For the Caribbean, where we’re cruising these days, my favourites are the ones written by Chris Doyle. He makes it perfectly clear that he loves to explore on foot —  and when he tells me to take a hike, I know it’s well worth following orders.

Don Casey’s many books include This Old Boat, Sailboat Electrics Simplified, and Don Casey’s Complete Illustrated Sailboat Maintenance Manual

Twenty Small Sailboats to Take You Anywhere

Twenty Small Sailboats to Take You Anywhere

Want to sail away? Then go. For most North Americans, the value of just the car in your driveway can fund a year-long cruise—not aboard this year’s “Best Full-size Cruiser” as decreed by your favorite sailing magazine, but aboard a seaworthy and comfortable sailboat of modest size and mature age. Reading John Vigor’s enlightening little book Twenty Small Sailboats to Take You Anywhere can be a life-changing experience. The featured boats are not only affordable, but they insulate you less from the cruising experience. A good thing. And a good book.


Anne Brevig is the author of 9 Years on the 7 Seas

World Cruising Routes

World Cruising Routes

I would like to recommend Jimmy Cornell’s World Cruising Routes. This book is an absolute must for offshore sailors and circumnavigators. We used it as our bible onboard!

More author recommendations on the way!

Favourite Nautical Books (Part 1)

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We asked some of our favourite authors (many of whom have been part of the speaker’s series we used to run with Harbourfront), to tell us about their favourite nautical book.  Here’s what some of them said:

Bob Hale, author, Waggoner Cruising Guide


Master and Commander, Book 1 of the 21 Book Aubrey-Maturin Series

Master and Commander


My favourite nautical book is actually 21 of them, the Aubrey/Maturin series of historical novels by Patrick O’Brian. They cross the line from story-telling to literature. Start with Master and Commander and work your way through them, one volume at a time. The series becomes richer with re-reading. I’m on my fourth or fifth trip through and I’m never bored.


John Rousmaniere, author, After the Storm, Fastnet, Force 10, and The Annapolis Book of Seamanship (among others)


All This, and Sailing Too

All This, and Sailing Too


There’s a special place in my heart for All This and Sailing, Too, the autobiography of the preeminent yacht designer Olin Stephens. In part this is because I was the book’s editor, working closely with Olin over several years.  But largely this is because Olin brings his remarkable life so thoroughly alive. There is much to learn here about boats — and about life, too.


Kathy Parsons, author, Spanish for Cruisers, French for Cruisers


World Cruising Destinations by Jimmy Cornell

World Cruising Destinations


My first thought on opening Jimmy Cornell’s newest book World Cruising Destinations is that it’s BEAUTIFUL. And it is: the photos are gorgeous, and the layout makes it fun to just pick up the book and read … about Croatia, Spain, Cuba, the Falklands, Antarctica, or any other of the 184 sailing destinations that the book covers. World Cruising Destinations gives you the WHOLE world through a boater’s eye, and of course, not just any boater’s eye, but with Jimmy Cornell’s decades of experience. It includes for each destination such information as country profile, map, climate, facilities, formalities, cruising guides, charter operations — and best of all, an understanding of where and how you cruise that area. If you’ve ever wondered what it would be like to sail or charter anywhere in the world, well now you can find out. It’s indispensable for planning your travels. Highly recommended!

Happy 30th anniversary!
We’ll have more author recommendations next week.