U-boats were central to Hitler's strategy, a major threat to the Allied forces. Intensely claustrophobic, at the mercy of the elements, they were also feared by their crews who had the highe... read more
The author pays tribute to the merchant seamen of many countries, as well as the Allied navies, who experienced the harrowing dangers of the Arctic convoys supporting the essential Soviet wa... read more
A difficult subject to write about, this, since wreckers tended not to leave written records, but this thrilling survey of maritime realpolitik from C15th - C17th sheds a vivid light on the ... read more
'Atlantis' is both metaphor and actual in this account of diving among ruins and wrecks. Le Bas also takes the reader down into the mysteries and myths of the deep.
Macfarlane's powerful new book is a beautiful torrent of vivid language and research - and also his most political work so far. As we'd expect from this remarkable writer, he ranges from the... read more
A collection of essays about our most basic need - water - with contributions by Rebecca Solnit, Ocean Vuong, Robin Wall Kimmerer, Lucy Jones, Vandana Shiva, Elif Shafak and others.
Reimagines Moby Dick from a female perspective. The heroine, born on the Kent coast in 1843, disguises herself as a cabin boy on a ship to NY and then joins a whaler...
A new translation by Matthew Hollis of an Anglo-Saxon poem - ‘The spirit-music of land and wind and sea' - paired with black-and-white photographs by Norman McBeath, who also wrote a short... read more
Twenty-seven remarkable people, including Mikhail Baryshnikov, Hannah Arendt, Gidon Kremer, Romain Gary, Mark Rothko, Arvo Pärt: their stories interwoven with the historical, ethnic and pol... read more
Famous for his vast terrestrial empire and the founding of the Yuan dynasty, Kublai also understood that maritime power would be key to China's success - and built the largest ships the worl... read more
The Safeguard of the Sea: 660-1649 came out in 1997. Vol 2 was The Command of the Ocean: 1649-1815 (2004). Here is the culmination to an astonishing, sustained work of scholarship.
A re-issue of MH's six-month journey around the Western Isles, illustrated with her watercolours. She lived on the island of Coll for many years, and is the author of the charming Katie Mora... read more
Sea-grass meadows and forests of swaying kelp; ethical and sustainable fishing - there is hope for our seas as well as the existential threat to them from deep-sea mining. In the running for... read more
From Romania, Serbia and Bulgaria, seasoned with other Central European influences - Austrian, Hungarian, Czech... Sauerkraut, horseradish, cornbread, pilafs and lamb stews.
More ships were lost to shipwreck than in battle during the Napoleonic Wars. This is a valuable study of the Hydrographic Office and its intrepid sailors, who gathered the intelligence that ... read more
Not so much a history of maps, this is a riveting account of the ways in which the carefully plotted lines of explorers have transformed the world. From Magellan and Cook to the distortions ... read more
The author and her brother spent a decade at sea; at sixteen she made it ashore in New Zealand, effectively abandoned by her parents. A startling and riveting memoir.
Born in 1833, Watt was a servant from the age of nine; later, she sold her husband's catch from door to door. After the death of most of her male relatives at sea, she was cared for in the C... read more
A surprising story of obsession, necessity, invention and adventure. One could really turn the title around for ice has preserved human history as few other mediums have.
The author of Oblomov spent the years 1852-1854 as secretary to Admiral Putyatin on board the Pallada; they sailed to Java, Singapore, Hong Kong, Japan, Shanghai, the Philippines and Korea. ... read more
Combines King's own single-handed crossing of the Atlantic in a 28-foot yacht with tales of others' experiences. By the author of Ahab's Rolling Sea: A Natural History of Moby-Dick.
The author and her brother spent a decade at sea; at sixteen she made it ashore in New Zealand, effectively abandoned by her parents. A startling and riveting memoir.