In 1973, Maurice and Maralyn Bailey set sail from England in a small sailboat. They were headed for New Zealand and had already crossed the Atlantic and navigated the Panama Canal, into the Pacific. About 500 miles from the Galapagos Islands, a sperm whale rammed their ship, cracking through its hull. Before it sank, they gathered what they could and hopped into a dinghy to which they tied a rubber raft. For weeks and then months they drifted. SPOILERS BELOW.
Spoiler: After 118 days of living (barely) on uncooked turtles, fish, birds, and just enough captured rainwater, they were rescued, feted, toasted as celebrities around the world. Then they set off on another voyage from England to Patagonia. Hoping to make money by writing an account of their second trip, they secured a book contract, despite an editorial warning that people read about disasters, not ordinary sailing trips. The same unfortunately applies to this book. The unfolding disaster of the Bailey’s slow float toward death in a tiny rubber raft is transfixing, but the subsequent narration of the rest of the Bailey’s lives not so much.