Great American Sailing Stories: Lyons Press Classics

Few people would want to test their mettle in an ice-encrusted boat with an Arctic explorer, sail the Straits of Magellan with Joshua Slocum, or watch with Owen Chase as an angry whale sends his ship to the bottom, thousands of miles from the nearest land. But it's quite another thing to read these true accounts while settled into a favorite chair.

Slocum and Chase persevered in the face of travails that would have given Job pause. Their stoic accounts are stronger and more dramatic for the...