Books : Strange Voyage of Donald Crowhurst
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by: Nicholas Tomalin, Ron Hall
Binding: Hardcover
EAN: 9780340129203
ISBN: 0340129204
Label: Hodder & Stoughton Ltd
Manufacturer: Hodder & Stoughton Ltd
Number Of Pages: 256
Publication Date: July 13, 1970
Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton Ltd
Sales Rank: 1622091
Studio: Hodder & Stoughton Ltd
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Editorial Review:
Product Description:
In the autumn of 1968, Donald Crowhurst set out from England in his untested trimaran, a competitor in the first singlehanded nonstop around-the-world sailboat race. Eight months later, the boat was found in mid-Atlantic with no one on board. Crowhurst's logs and diaries revealed that, although he had radioed messages from his supposed round-the-world course, he had in fact never left the Atlantic. This journalistic masterpiece reconstructs what happened: Crowhurst's growing distrust of his boat; his first decision to attempt one of the great hoaxes of our time; the lying radio transmissions; the ``triumphal'' return up the Atlantic as the elapsed-time race leader; and the fantastic ending. The Strange Last Voyage of Donald Crowhurst is both a suspenseful narrative and a psychological casebook of human zeal and anguish.
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating: - A gift and a legacy
Through the authors Donald Crowhurst has left a tragic legacy for his family and a powerful gift for us the readers. Through his logs Donald documented his fallibilities and revealed his decision path. We are able to armchair quarterback, speculate how we might have done things differently and learn.
The illusion of our own grandeur is revealed through this book. We can be smug about our own approaches and look at the trials and misadventures of others with superiority. However, lurking ... Read More
Rating:  - Deeply thought-provoking and disturbing tale of human nature
In 1968, a London newspaper, inspired by recent feats of daring in the world of sailing, sponsored a contest that offered a trophy and large cash prize to the first person to successfully complete a solo, non-stop and unaided circumnavigation of the globe in a sailboat. This book is the morbidly fascinating story of one of the participants, Donald Crowhurst, a talented amateur sailor and electronics entrepreneur, who announced that he would build the world's most technologically advanced boat, including ... Read More
Rating: - Extraordinary story with one complaint...
I've read the reviews of "Strange Last Voyage," and while I concur with many of the thoughtful, accurate reviews, I can only give the book four stars. My beef? The persistently unsympathetic tone in the book.
Crowhurst's fate was a tragic one and deserving of sympathy. While it was the culmination of many poor decisions (an understatement, indeed!), that he ended up in a position of such desperation merits at least a bit more compassion than the authors are willing to grant. I understand their ... Read More
Rating: - Alone, alone, all, all alone, alone on a wide wide sea!
This is a wonderful book about a truly remarkable, moving and literally tragic misadventure. I first stumbled across Donald Crowhurst's story through a terrific Channel 4 feature film, Deep Water, and was so captivated by it that I bought this and another account of the race (fellow competitor Bernard Moitessier's The Long Way (which, for the record, doesn't really touch on the Crowhurst story)).
The Bard himself could not have scripted a tragedy better than this. Crowhurst, a mercurial but fundamentally ... Read More
Rating: - A powerful, moving must-read
This is a must-read classic for any armchair sailor or adventurer. It tells the story of one of nine entrants in the first around-the-world sailing race, Donald Crowhurst, who perpetuated one of the great hoaxes of the 20th century before mysteriouly disappearing. Jonathan Raban, Fellow of the Royal Social of Literature (among his many accolades)writes in the introduction, "I've been reading the Strange Last Voyage every year for more than twenty years, and with each further reading, the Crowhurst story deepends and ... Read More
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