Books reviewed by Paul Talbot - The International Marine Book of Sailing

The International Marine Book of Sailing

by Robby Robinson
published by McGraw-Hill
RRP $59.95 (520pp; 280mm x 210mm)
  Published in December 2008 in hard-back, The International Marine Book of Sailing claims to be a sailing book like no other. It aims to tell you “everything you need to know, from your first afternoon sail to advanced racing and bluewater voyaging”. Well, in 500 odd pages and at a price that might make some shudder, perhaps it should.
  Author, William ‘Robby’ Robinson has a sailing pedigree that commands respect. He has been a practical and competitive sailor up to and including crewing on America’s Cup 12 metre, Weatherly. He has co-authored a couple of books, as well as being an English teacher. Finally, Robinson is a former SAIL magazine editor and sailing instructor.
  Robinson’s goal for this book, apart from getting you sailing in a single afternoon, is to provide instruction in sailing in an “as you need it” way. His Preface to the book acknowledges the benefit of “experience” as the best teacher.
  But his aim is to augment experience with measured doses of information in a staged process.
  Take one of the early Chapters, Controlling Your Boat and the Section on Setting the Jib. In seven packed pages, filled with colour photos to illustrate various points, Robinson takes the reader action-by-action through setting the jib on dinghies, keelboats and boats with roller-furled jibs.
  The book explains and shows the effects of poorly set jibs, illustrates all the blocks, cleats, winches, sheets and shrouds that might be relevant to this topic. And follows it up with a section on trimming.
  Similarly, at the more advanced end of the book, a terrific section on ‘Flying a Spinnaker’ is simply described and intricately illustrated. The description of the sail itself is complete, together with the relevant running gear. There are step-by-step photos of hoisting the spinnaker aboard a two-handed dinghy with accompanying step-by-step descriptions. The same steps aboard a small keelboat follow this. Once the sail is hoisted, the section goes on to describe trimming the sail for best effect with photos to show the outcomes. And then there is a section on the bane of many sailors’ lives – gybing the spinnaker (although Robby spells it differently).
  Robinson brings his racing knowledge to bear in the Chapter on Racing and it might be here that many sailors will get significant “bang for their buck”. There would be little to ask after studying – not just reading – this part of the book. Everything from start to finish-line is covered with diagrams to illustrate laylines and tactics. It is an impressive study of yacht racing.
  And that is the way the rest of the book is structured – easy to read instructions with easy to follow diagrams and photos on the myriad of issues you need to know to go sailing. Starting with Chapter 1 First Sail, the author eases the reader through each topic. After seven chapters, the reader is going cruising, having previously read up on Sailing Seamanship, Sailing Farther Sailing Better, Navigating, Racing and Going Cruising.
  So does the book live up to its claims? The answer is yes. The author has drawn on a wealth of sailing knowledge from colleagues, but most of it is clearly his own. With the massive number of photos helping to show the same lessons in a variety of sailing craft, the reader would be hard pressed not to find their own situation covered (even though the individual makes of boats might differ from Australian conditions).
  Here is a book well worth a browse when you see it on the bookshop shelf. With the quality of production of this publication, if the information meets your needs, then the price is not an issue.