Here are 99 books that To The Edge Of The World fans have personally recommended if you like
To The Edge Of The World.
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Like a caricature, satire lets you see reality better by exaggerating it. When satire is done right, every element, from the overall plot to the characters to paragraph-level details, is there to cast an exposing light on some part of our real world. They are books that exist on many levels, expose hubris and essential misunderstandings, and generally speak truth to power. They should leave the reader reassessing core assumptions about how the world works. I’ve written a best-selling nonfiction book about machine learning in the past, and I probably could have taken that approach again, but AI and American politics are both ripe for satire.
I couldn’t look at society the same way after reading this tale of how a group of schoolboys stranded on an island descends, step by step, into savagery. The savagery is inside all of us, and the veneer of civilization that our education puts on it is very thin and easily cracks. Haunting.
A plane crashes on a desert island and the only survivors, a group of schoolboys, assemble on the beach and wait to be rescued. By day they inhabit a land of bright fantastic birds and dark blue seas, but at night their dreams are haunted by the image of a terrifying beast. As the boys' delicate sense of order fades, so their childish dreams are transformed into something more primitive, and their behaviour starts to take on a murderous, savage significance.
First published in 1954, Lord of the Flies is one of the most celebrated and widely read of modern…
I love adventure—I'm an adventurist. I love escaping—through creative writing and the written word! And, I love the sea—I have served over 30 years in the US Coast Guard at sea and ashore and recently drove Zodiacs in Alaska and Norway for Seabourn Cruise ships. Since publishing my first book, So Others May Live about heroic US Coast Guard rescue swimmers and aircrews (read by Kevin Costner and Ashton Kutcher who both told me they loved my book and used it for their roles in film, The Guardian), I have become a TEDx speaker and coach, award-winning author and rose to the senior rank of captain in the USCG.
This is an adventure! Turn the pages of this book to find waves and many kinds of waves: rogue, freak, and giant waves of the ocean and the people who try to surf them. I am a retired US Coast Guard officer and sailed many ships at sea. As a mariner we know of or have seen waves, some of them tossing our ships in the middle of the night as we try to sail home. Any number of ships have vanished in the ocean, quickly, with no time to put out an SOS call for help. This is a great book to learn more while having an adventure reading it from the safety of your chair.
The have long been mariners' tales of 100-foot rogue waves - gargantuan monsters that sink super-tankers in the blink of an eye.
But waves that high violate the laws of physics, so science has dismissed them as myth. Until now.
In February 2000 the research ship, RRS Discovery, was trapped by a vortex of mammoth waves in the North Atlantic. Amazingly the ship survived and its state-of-the-art equipment registered waves nearing 100-feet. Something scary is brewing in the planet's waters. And with 72% of earth covered by sea, this is serious business.
I grew up as a closeted homosexual in a fundamentalist Christian home, enduring nearly two decades in a crisis of faith. Sermons frequently warned of damnation for my natural inclinations, pushing me to fast, pray, and achieve to resist temptation. This crisis gradually resolved over the eight years I spent writing Playing by the Book, the first coming-out novel to win a National IPPY Medal in religious fiction. Although I don’t consider myself a spiritual writer, I am drawn to stories that explore existential struggles and triumphs, including those related to a crisis of faith—much like the characters in the novels on this list.
I loved this book for its fantastical portrayal of a Pacific voyage that mirrors the internal conflicts many of us face. Like Pi, who embraced multiple faiths during his ordeal, I searched for answers to reconcile my faith and sexuality across various denominations, religions, and philosophies.
Pi’s story as he journeys across the Pacific, a tiger in tow, allowed me to reflect on the moments when I felt alone, wrestling with my faith in the face of an overwhelming challenge, given my fundamentalist upbringing.
After the sinking of a cargo ship, a solitary lifeboat remains bobbing on the wild blue Pacific. The only survivors from the wreck are a sixteen-year-old boy named Pi, a hyena, a wounded zebra, an orangutan—and a 450-pound Royal Bengal tiger.
Soon the tiger has dispatched all but Pi Patel, whose fear, knowledge, and cunning allow him to coexist with the tiger, Richard Parker, for 227 days while lost at sea. When they finally reach the coast of Mexico, Richard Parker flees to the jungle, never to be seen again. The Japanese authorities who interrogate Pi refuse to believe his…
I romantically believe that the sea runs in my blood. On the Norwegian side of my family, my grandfather was a boat builder, and my uncle a whaler. I’m a surfer, and I’ve worked in whale and dolphins conservation for many years. So I’m drawn to the ocean and – as work and family duties keep me inland more than I’d like – when unable to get in or on the water, I get my fix with salty tales; some of which I read and some of which I write. The books on this list are all classics, in my view; they all speak to the enigma of the ocean; an ever-changing scape, full of alien life. I hope you enjoy them, and also Girl. Boy. Sea.
There are only a few characters, and a very distinct, small setting (the Scilly Isles), but as always Morpurgo packs a great deal in.
Family relations, small-minded community prejudice, the effect and impact of war, myth, the power of land and seascape, the meaning of nationhood, all wonderfully threaded into a simple tale that builds and builds to a perfect ending.
And of course, being a Morpurgo tale, it is beautifully written.
An exciting historical adventure from War Horse author and former Children's Laureate Michael Morpurgo.
Gracie and her friend Daniel have always been warned to stay away from the Birdman and his side of the island. But then they find a message in the sand and discover the Birdman is not who they thought. They build up a lovely friendship with him, but when the children get stranded on Samson Island they don't know whether to believe the birdman's story that the island is cursed.
Set against the backdrop of the First World War, in the tradition of Friend or Foe…
As a child growing up in a rural community in the isle of Lewis, there were very few books I read which had any real connection with my local environment. This changed in my late teenage years when I encountered some of the books I mentioned here, together with some works about rural communities and islands in Ireland. I loved the way these books – including poetry, drama, non-fiction, short stories, and novels – opened my eyes and enabled me to see familiar surroundings in new and enlightening ways. The legacy of this still persists within me today.
There are probably more fantasies and myths about the Hebridean island of St Kilda than any other location in existence – though there are a few other Scottish islands that compete in this field!
Roger’s book is excellent because it is grounded in fact and meticulous research, yet it is also a celebration of this unique landscape to be found at the far western edge of the Outer Hebrides.
St Kilda is the most romantic and most romanticised group of islands in Europe. Soaring out of the North Atlantic Ocean like Atlantis come back to life, the islands have captured the imagination of the outside world for hundreds of years. Their inhabitants, Scottish Gaels who lived off the land, the sea and by birdcatching on high and precipitous cliffs, were long considered to be the Noble Savages of the British Isles, living in a state of natural grace.
St Kilda: A People's History explores and portrays the life of the St Kildans from the Stone Age to 1930, when…
I am a retired history teacher with 36 years of teaching experience in high school and college. I am also a passionate world traveler and for over four decades led students on overseas tours. In 2012 (the year I retired from teaching) I released my first novel, Widder’s Landing set in Kentucky in the early 1800s. One of my main characters came from a family of Irish Catholics—and he is featured in Rebels Abroad. Ireland has always fascinated me and in my nine trips to the country, I smelled the peat fires, tasted the whiskey, listened to the music and the lyrical tales told by the tour leaders—and came to love the people.
A Place Called Freedom attracted me instantly because of its multiple settings (Scotland, London, and Virginia) and the theme of ordinary people struggling against adversity.
The novel provides vivid insight into governmental repression of religion and the denial of basic human rights. As a historian, I enjoy reading historical fiction. Follett is a master of his craft, blending human interest stories with accurate history. Through his characters, he shows how people lived and reacted to historical events.
A Place Called Freedom transports the reader into the years prior to the American Revolution, and his vivid geographical descriptions made me feel like “I was there!”
Set in an era of turbulent social changes on both sides of the Atlantic, A Place Called Freedom is a magnificent historical fiction novel from the undisputed master of suspense and drama, Ken Follett.
A Life of Poverty Scotland, 1767. Mack McAsh is a slave by birth, destined for a cruel and harsh life as a miner. But as a man of principles and courage, he has the strength to stand up for what he believes in, only to be labelled as a rebel and enemy of the state.
A Life of Wealth Life feels just as constrained for rebellious…
Primarily I’m a wife and mother, who loves holidays and writing about our experiences: from the many family holidays in a static caravan 90 minutes’ drive from our hometown in Scotland to the wonderful opportunities we’ve had to travel the world since, including through my work as a lecturer (when the family came too for a holiday while I worked!) or with friends. I like reading other authors’ personal experiences especially when I’m drawn into feeling I’m with the author during the travels, experiencing what’s not always included in travel guidebooks: the not-so-good as well as the good, the challenging as well as the amazing.
This book is out of print but available in a second-hand market and worth finding. My copy once belonged to my Grandma.
I’ve learned preparation for a holiday or journey is key to success. This book tells the background which led to Ann and her husband acquiring Reliance, a 2-masted sailing ship. Making it sea-worthy was far from straightforward. Their journey to cross the Atlantic began in extremely difficult circumstances. The book recounts in agonising detail the journey’s progress and ending.
I felt as I read this book I was with Ann and Frank, through the many ups and downs they experienced. I’m full of admiration for their resilience and determination.
The author, Ann, later became the first woman to single-handedly sail across the Atlantic Ocean in 1952.
LAST VOYAGE is the enthralling true story of Frank and Ann Davison; of their search for a life of freedom and adventures that was to end so tragically.
Frank and Ann Davison were both joyride pilots when they met, fell in love and married. They pursued various ventures bebore buying an island in Loch Lomond, where they reared geese and goats. Their apparently idyllic lifestyle turned sour, so they bought an old and dilapidated fishing ketch, RELIANCE, in which they planned to voyage to the far corners of the world. But the Herculean task of conversion stretched their finances too…
My passion for tales of seafarers and Atlantic history, more generally, emerged from my own wanderlust and love of travel. I’m constantly amazed at how early modern sailors crossed the globe amidst the most pressing challenges imaginable. By reading these sailing histories, with accounts of everything from monsoons to cannibalism, we might not feel quite so inconvenienced by a short flight or train delay! During my academic career, I have had the opportunity to complete research in different parts of Britain. This experience of living transatlantically has transferred to my scholarship and outlook. I hope you find the books on my list as fun and fascinating as I have!
I appreciate this book for bringing the local into the world of Atlantic seafarers. Daniel Vickers is one of the deans of early American social history (he is one of the historians mentioned in the Harvard bar scene in the film Good Will Hunting) and turns his talents here to explain how American seamen were different in the Age of Sail. The simple answer is that they were young. Unlike the long-distance professional seafarers of Europe, sailing in America, especially New England was more of a life stage on the way to other jobs and pursuits.
These sailors were not rootless wanderers forced to go to sea because they were poor; they were rooted in specific communities and filled a necessary role in local economies. As exciting as we find tales of mutiny, scurvy, and shipwrecks, most early American seafarers lived much more stable lives. I find this variation…
Two centuries of American maritime history, in which the Atlantic Ocean remained the great frontier.
Two centuries of American maritime history, in which the Atlantic Ocean remained the great frontier Westward expansion has been the great narrative of the first two centuries of American history, but as historian Daniel Vickers demonstrates here, the horizon extended in all directions. For those who lived along the Atlantic coast, it was the East-and the Atlantic Ocean-that beckoned. While historical and fictional accounts have tended to stress the exceptional circumstances or psychological compulsions that drove men to sea, this book shows how normal a…
I’ve always wanted to know why people acquire the things they choose, how they get them, and what they do with them. For years, too, I’ve been fascinated by the period when modernity was being born, a time full of worldwide exploration, the founding of new nations and societies, and the invention of new ways of making, transporting, and distributing all sorts of goods and services. I discovered that studying consumers, consumer goods, and trade from the mid-seventeenth to the late eighteenth century was the perfect way to satisfy my curiosity. The Material Atlantic is my report about what I’ve learned.
Across the globe, silks have been the most prized textiles for a very long time. They are also among the most expensive, owing to the difficulties and skills involved in cultivating silkworms, unreeling and spinning raw silk, and then weaving it into cloth.
Despite the complications involved, silk’s desirability led settlers throughout the colonial Americas to try time and again to establish silkworm-raising and silk-making enterprises. Their ambitions were just as repeatedly frustrated.
Ben Marsh’s beautifully written, deeply researched study tells why they kept trying and why they kept failing. When I first encountered this book, I wondered whether a study of flop after flop could possibly be interesting. I wonder no longer. Failure turns out to make for a fascinating story.
One of the greatest hopes and expectations that accompanied American colonialism - from its earliest incarnation - was that Atlantic settlers would be able to locate new sources of raw silk, with which to satiate the boundless desire for luxurious fabrics in European markets. However, in spite of the great upheavals and achievements of Atlantic plantation, this ambition would never be fulfilled. By taking the commercial failure of silk seriously and examining numerous experiments across New Spain, New France, British North America and the early United States, Ben Marsh reveals new insights into aspiration, labour, environment, and economy in these…
Will Stolzenburg writes about wild things, with particular focus on great predators and the vanishing places they inhabit. A wildlife biologist and magazine editor in former lives, he has since written three non-fiction books concerning those irreplaceable predators, plus a children’s story about a dog with a magically happy tail that's pretty close to true.
Rachel Carson will forever be known for Silent Spring, her courageous, farsighted warning of our pesticidal poisoning of the world. But it was her three ocean-oriented books preceding Silent Spring that best showcase her artistic melding of meticulous research with her wide-eyed sense of wonder. And none more so than UnderThe Sea Wind, her first and most intimate work,tracingthe seasonal travails of fish and shorebirds—living, heroic creatures we come to know by name—through their inspiring, interlocking circles of life.
"Under the Sea-Wind" presents a naturalist's picture of ocean life. This book is her breathtaking canvas of the fierce, competitive struggle for life takes place along the shore, in the open sea, and along the sea bottom.
