8 books like East Is a Big Bird

By Thomas Gladwin,

Here are 8 books that East Is a Big Bird fans have personally recommended if you like East Is a Big Bird. Shepherd is a community of 12,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of Sailing Alone Around the World

Harold Bergman Author Of When the Dream Becomes a Nightmare

From my list on the romance and reality of ocean sailing.

Why am I passionate about this?

Similar to many other men and women, when I was younger and more naïve, I had the romantic dream of sailing around the world, exploring and experiencing new times in exotic places. Like many others who turned that dream into reality, I quickly learned the new and exotic moments were far out-shadowed by the life-threatening, dream-ending, nightmare realities of ocean sailing. Fortunately, I ended the voyage before I killed myself. I wanted to share my dream and nightmare experiences with those who dream.

Harold's book list on the romance and reality of ocean sailing

Harold Bergman Why did Harold love this book?

I like this book because it was the first book I read as a child about sailing around the world. It filled me with a sense of adventure that ignited in me a desire to do the same while also filling me with a sense of dread.

Unfortunately, I focused more on the romance of the story than on the reality. 

By Joshua Slocum,

Why should I read it?

4 authors picked Sailing Alone Around the World as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

"The classic of its kind." —Travel World
"One of the most readable books in the whole library of adventure." —Sports Illustrated
"The finest single-handed adventure story yet written." —Seafarer
Challenged by an expert who said it couldn't be done, Joshua Slocum, an indomitable New England sea captain, set out in April of 1895 to prove that a man could sail alone around the world. 46,000 miles and a little over 3 years later, the proof was complete: Captain Slocum had performed the epic "first" single-handedly in a trusty 34-foot sloop called the "Spray." This is Slocum's own account of his…


Book cover of We, the Navigators: The Ancient Art of Landfinding in the Pacific

Richard Feinberg Author Of Polynesian Seafaring and Navigation: Ocean Travel in Anutan Culture and Society

From my list on Pacific wayfinding.

Why am I passionate about this?

My book builds on the foundation laid by my five recommended books (as well as several others). Anuta is a remote Polynesian community in the Solomon Islands. It is one of the few remaining islands where voyaging canoes are still constructed regularly, constitute a part of everyday life, and where inter-island travel in such canoes never ceased. I was first there for a year in 1972–73 and was introduced to Anutan maritime practice. During that visit, I took part in a four-day voyage to Patutaka, an uninhabited island thirty miles away. 

Richard's book list on Pacific wayfinding

Richard Feinberg Why did Richard love this book?

In this book, David Lewis—a physician, anthropologist, and world sailor—traveled around the Pacific, consulting with respected navigators from many islands about their understandings and the natural cues on which they relied for inter-island voyaging. Lewis reinforced many of Gladwin’s points and also made me acutely aware of regional variation.

Along the way, he commented that canoes in the “Polynesian Outliers” (islands inhabited by Polynesian people but located in territory commonly identified as “Melanesia” or “Micronesia”) are built with an interchangeable bow and stern. That was not true on Anuta, the Polynesian Outlier on which I had conducted my doctoral research, and I thought the discrepancy was worth a brief comment in a professional journal. I began writing, and by the time I was done, I had a first draft of my book on Anutan seafaring.

By David Lewis, Derek Oulton (editor),

Why should I read it?

3 authors picked We, the Navigators as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This new edition includes a discussion of theories about traditional methods of navigation developed during recent decades, the story of the renaissance of star navigation throughout the Pacific, and material about navigation systems in Indonesia, Siberia, and the Indian Ocean.


Book cover of South: A Memoir of the Endurance Voyage

David Barrie Author Of Supernavigators: Exploring the Wonders of How Animals Find Their Way

From my list on the sea and navigation.

Why am I passionate about this?

I've been a sailor all my life and fell in love with the art of navigation when I was crossing the Atlantic in a 35-foot yacht at the age of 19. Learning how to fix my position in the middle of a vast, featureless ocean by the light of the sun and stars was a life-changing experience. Since then I have sailed all over the world and made many long ocean passages. My book Sextant describes the crucial role that celestial navigation played in the exploration and charting of the world's oceans, and how the development of GPS is profoundly changing our relationship with the natural world.

David's book list on the sea and navigation

David Barrie Why did David love this book?

South is a truly epic account of endurance and survival in the Antarctic. It describes how Shackleton and his crew stayed alive after their ship was crushed in pack ice, and how he and a handful of men crossed the wild Southern Ocean in mid-winter in a 20-foot sailing boat to bring help to those left behind. Not only did they have to cope with hurricanes and mountainous seas in freezing temperatures, but they also had to make an accurate landfall on a small island more than 800 miles away.

Even then their troubles weren't over, as they had to climb a range of high, unexplored mountains to reach help on the other side. As a sailor myself I'm awe-struck by Shackleton's voyage, and the extraordinary navigational feats it involved. If I ever think I'm having a bad day, I remember the terrible hardships that he and his men faced…

By Ernest Shackleton,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked South as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

His destination Antarctica, his expectations high, veteran explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton set out, on the eve of the First World War, in pursuit of his goal to lead the first expedition across the last unknown continent. Instead, his ship, the Endurance, became locked in sea ice, and for nine months Shackleton fought a losing battle with the elements before the drifting ship was crushed and his crew marooned. Shackleton's gripping account of his incredible voyage follows him and his men across 600 miles of unstable ice floes to a barren rock called Elephant Island. It records how, with a crew…


Book cover of Finding Your Way Without Map or Compass

David Barrie Author Of Supernavigators: Exploring the Wonders of How Animals Find Their Way

From my list on the sea and navigation.

Why am I passionate about this?

I've been a sailor all my life and fell in love with the art of navigation when I was crossing the Atlantic in a 35-foot yacht at the age of 19. Learning how to fix my position in the middle of a vast, featureless ocean by the light of the sun and stars was a life-changing experience. Since then I have sailed all over the world and made many long ocean passages. My book Sextant describes the crucial role that celestial navigation played in the exploration and charting of the world's oceans, and how the development of GPS is profoundly changing our relationship with the natural world.

David's book list on the sea and navigation

David Barrie Why did David love this book?

Gatty was a remarkable, pioneering aviator from Tasmania and the first person to bring the art of natural navigation to a wide audience. During the Second World War, he taught navigation to US military airmen, and wrote a guide to survival at sea that was standard issue and probably saved quite a few lives: The Raft Book. Finding Your Way (which first came out in the 1950s under the title Nature Is Your Guide), builds on that earlier work and is a mine of fascinating information and anecdotes on which I drew extensively in writing Incredible Journeys.

Gatty was a real expert and discusses how all our senses can help us find our way, even in very difficult circumstances. For example, he tells of an Inuit hunter who, paddling his kayak in thick fog, was able to find the entrance of his home fjord by listening out for…

By Harold Gatty,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Finding Your Way Without Map or Compass as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?


During his remarkable lifetime, Harold Gatty became one of the world's great navigators (in 1931, he and Wiley Post flew around the world in a record-breaking eight days) and, to the benefit of posterity, recorded in this book much of his accumulated knowledge about pathfinding both on land and at sea.
Applying methods used by primitive peoples and early explorers, the author shows how to determine location, study wind directions and reflections in the sky, even how to use the senses of smell and hearing to find your way in the wilderness, in a desert, in snow-covered areas, and on…


Book cover of Treasure Island

Len Travers Author Of The Notorious Edward Low: Pursuing the Last Great Villain of Piracy's Golden Age

From my list on curing you of DPS (Disney Pirate Syndrome).

Why am I passionate about this?

Let's face it: pirates of the Golden Age are just cool. No one would actually want to encounter them, but they have been the stuff of escapist dreams since childhood. Adventure, fellowship, treasure–the “romantic” aspects of piracy are what make these otherwise nasty individuals anti-heroes par excellence. As an adult and academic and as an occasional crewman on square riggers, I adopted pirates as a favorite sub-set of maritime history. As with other aspects of the past, I view the history of pirates and piracy as really two narratives: what the records tell us happened and why and what our persistent fascination with them reveals about us.

Len's book list on curing you of DPS (Disney Pirate Syndrome)

Len Travers Why did Len love this book?

In my humble opinion, this is the greatest adventure tale in the English language!

Robert Louis Stevenson practically invented pirates for the modern world, particularly his chief antagonist, the crippled but formidable Long John Silver. Highly intelligent, cunning, crafty, ruthless, yet somehow appealing, Silver set the standard for all pirate heroes to come.

Whenever I get bogged down studying pirates, I turn to Treasure Island to remember what it is to enjoy my subject!

By Robert Louis Stevenson,

Why should I read it?

15 authors picked Treasure Island as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it. This book is for kids age 9, 10, 11, and 12.

What is this book about?

Penguin presents the audio CD edition of Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson.

Following the demise of bloodthirsty buccaneer Captain Flint, young Jim Hawkins finds himself with the key to a fortune. For he has discovered a map that will lead him to the fabled Treasure Island. But a host of villains, wild beasts and deadly savages stand between him and the stash of gold. Not to mention the most infamous pirate ever to sail the high seas . . .


Book cover of Vikings of the Sunrise

Richard Feinberg Author Of Polynesian Seafaring and Navigation: Ocean Travel in Anutan Culture and Society

From my list on Pacific wayfinding.

Why am I passionate about this?

My book builds on the foundation laid by my five recommended books (as well as several others). Anuta is a remote Polynesian community in the Solomon Islands. It is one of the few remaining islands where voyaging canoes are still constructed regularly, constitute a part of everyday life, and where inter-island travel in such canoes never ceased. I was first there for a year in 1972–73 and was introduced to Anutan maritime practice. During that visit, I took part in a four-day voyage to Patutaka, an uninhabited island thirty miles away. 

Richard's book list on Pacific wayfinding

Richard Feinberg Why did Richard love this book?

This book was also published under the title Vikings of the Pacific and was written by New Zealand Māori scholar Sir Peter Buck (also known by his Māori name, Te Rangi Hīroa). It was a pioneering work explaining, from an Indigenous perspective, the process through which the islands of Polynesia came to be settled over thousands of years by voyagers traveling in outrigger or double-hulled canoes without navigational instruments.

As an anthropologist whose research has focused on Polynesia and who has always been interested in maritime issues, I was intrigued by the questions this book raised and motivated to explore them during my own ethnographic fieldwork.

By Peter H. Buck,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Vikings of the Sunrise as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Pp. xiii, 335; frontispiece plate of the author, 57 black-and-white photo-plates, 4 maps. Publisher’s original wine-red cloth, lettered in gilt on the spine and front cover, front cover with gilt boat, endpaper maps, 8vo. The author served as director of the Bernice B. Bishop Museum in Hawaii. The volume discusses the peopling of the islands of the Pacific Ocean in detail. No ownership marks.


Book cover of Hokule'a: The Way to Tahiti

Richard Feinberg Author Of Polynesian Seafaring and Navigation: Ocean Travel in Anutan Culture and Society

From my list on Pacific wayfinding.

Why am I passionate about this?

My book builds on the foundation laid by my five recommended books (as well as several others). Anuta is a remote Polynesian community in the Solomon Islands. It is one of the few remaining islands where voyaging canoes are still constructed regularly, constitute a part of everyday life, and where inter-island travel in such canoes never ceased. I was first there for a year in 1972–73 and was introduced to Anutan maritime practice. During that visit, I took part in a four-day voyage to Patutaka, an uninhabited island thirty miles away. 

Richard's book list on Pacific wayfinding

Richard Feinberg Why did Richard love this book?

Ben Finney was a surfer, sailor, and anthropologist who spent his career at the University of Hawai‘i and was a founder of the Polynesian Voyaging Society (PVS). The PVS built Hōkūle‘a, a double-hulled sailing canoe modeled on a traditional Hawaiian design but constructed of modern materials.

Finney, then, was part of a team that sailed from Hawai‘i to Tahiti in 1976 without instruments under the leadership of Pius “Mau” Piailug, a renowned navigator from the Micronesian island of Satawal. This book is Finney’s account of that journey and its many challenges.

Hōkūle‘a and the PVS’s experience helped inspire me to write my volume on Anutan seamanship, and Finney wrote the foreword. Later, in 2007, he joined me in a study of Taumako voyaging.

By Ben R. Finney,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Hokule'a as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Dust Jacket: "In 1976 there occurred one of the most daring and unusual voyages of modern times - the sailing of a reconstruction of an ancient double-hull Polynesian canoe with a full crew aboard from Hawaii to Tahiti and return, covering a distance of almost 6000 miles. A dedicated group of scientists, sailors, and other volunteers, led by the author, had for years worked on this project, the object of which was to retrace the legendary voyages that once linked those far-flung islands and in doing so demonstrate to skeptics that the ancient Polynesians could have intentionally sailed across vast…


Book cover of Kon Tiki: Across the Pacific by Raft

Richard Feinberg Author Of Polynesian Seafaring and Navigation: Ocean Travel in Anutan Culture and Society

From my list on Pacific wayfinding.

Why am I passionate about this?

My book builds on the foundation laid by my five recommended books (as well as several others). Anuta is a remote Polynesian community in the Solomon Islands. It is one of the few remaining islands where voyaging canoes are still constructed regularly, constitute a part of everyday life, and where inter-island travel in such canoes never ceased. I was first there for a year in 1972–73 and was introduced to Anutan maritime practice. During that visit, I took part in a four-day voyage to Patutaka, an uninhabited island thirty miles away. 

Richard's book list on Pacific wayfinding

Richard Feinberg Why did Richard love this book?

This book is Thor Heyerdahl’s account of a 4,000-mile voyage, in 1947, on a balsa-wood raft from Peru to French Polynesia. Heyerdahl hypothesized that Polynesia was originally settled from the Americas. When supposed experts responded that Indigenous people lacked the technology to make such a voyage, he set out to prove them wrong. Evidence now makes it clear that Oceania was populated from Asia rather than lands to the east. Nonetheless, Heyerdahl demonstrated that humans can safely traverse the open sea using small craft built from natural materials.

Heyerdahl’s book sold millions of copies, was translated into dozens of languages, and led to an award-winning film. It stimulated interest in indigenous seafaring and inspired generations of researchers to sail with mariners from small, remote island communities and to document their exploits. I count myself among those so inspired.

By Thor Heyerdahl, F. H. Lyon,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Kon Tiki as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?



Book cover of Sailing Alone Around the World
Book cover of We, the Navigators: The Ancient Art of Landfinding in the Pacific
Book cover of South: A Memoir of the Endurance Voyage

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