Red Flags in Blue Water

On the ocean, some voyages proceed smoothly, and some go weirdly south. It’s the weirder ones, selected from the many passages made by the author over sixteen years as an offshore delivery captain, that are collected here. None are full-scale disasters, but even minor calamities are exciting enough on a small boat, whose mechanical systems are constantly doing their best to disintegrate, on which crew relations can spiral into dysfunction, and where you’re vulnerably exposed to unpredicted rough weather. A reader might wonder, weren’t there signs beforehand that a voyage was likely to go south? What were you thinking?! The author might be wondering the same thing.