Against the Sea: Great Adventure Stories - Stranger Than Fiction

Boat/US Magazine, Jan, 2002 by Louisa Rudeen

Winter-bound boaters may need a manicure after getting through this collection of nail-biters - 24 true tales of sea survival from the editors of Motorboating magazine. Packed into a paperback edition, the variety of stories and authors make this quick, entertaining reading.

From the rescue of the crew on the Mistral in the nor'easter of The Perfect Storm fame, to a couple's sinking by whales in the Pacific and their 66 days in a life raft, most of the stories in the book are recounted by the survivors themselves who, fortunately, lived to come back from the sea.

Since each story is boiled down to about the length of a magazine feature, it's a handy book to pick up for the reader who does not have too much time to invest in any one disaster. Some of the stories are well known, but fun to read about once again, for example media mogul Ted Turner's recounting of the Fastnet Race storm disaster, Tania Aebi's solo circumnavigation at 18 years of age, and a record-setting powerboat race nonstop from Miami to Maine.

Our personal favorite was "Across the Atlantic by Outboard." Boatbuilder Al Grover's story of his odd dream of a transatlantic crossing in one of his own 26-foot Long Island-built skiffs is a hoot. With only twin 65-hp Evinrudes, Grover and his two sons motored 3,000 miles in 33 days, setting a record by crossing from Newfoundland to Portugal. Dodging Hurricane Claudette and making friends who helped watch out for him from Nova Scotia to the Azores, Grover said the best thing about his feat was how it brought him closer to his two sons.