A friend of mine from college is thinking about heading out to sea. They are slowly making the plans to get sailing as soon as they can figure out some of the details. I offered up a list of good books to have on board to her and then thought "hey maybe I should post these on the blog too." So here are some books I think every cruiser and many coastal sailors should have on board - and yes this is only a small sample of the ridiculous number of books we have on board.
Anything by Nigel Calder - He is the boat god. We have most if not all of his books. If we have a maintenance issue we've learned to check Calder first. The four I know for sure we have on board are:
Boatowner's Mechanical and Electrical Manual - Mark LOVES this book
Marine Diesel Engines
Cruising Handbook
How to Read a Nautical Chart
World Cruising Routes by Jimmy Cornell - basically tells you where you can go and when.
The Voyager's Handbook by Beth Leonard - Good all around book about everything cruising.
So these are the books I told her to start with. If anyone is interested I'd be happy to look through our books and see what other good recommendations I can come up with.