The Voyage of The Aegre book is almost ready for the printer. And more on one of the origins of the voyage idea, the passage of a cloth-covered curragh from Ireland to Iona off NW Scotland in 1963.
Publishing progress
This week, the page maker, Dr Digby, is finalising the details with Gutenberg Press in Malta, who will print the book. Little by little, it’s coming together.
More background to the voyage
An adventure like The Aegre voyage doesn’t just happen. In the early part of the book, I write about some of the people and stories that led me to think such a voyage was not just possible but a practical way to go sailing far on a small budget, a sort of cycle camping alternative to a big expensive camper van. It’s in the hope of inspiring others to take an adventurous course that I’ve written the book. One of my inspirations to go sailing was the story of my uncle who went to sea in a traditional Irish curragh, dressed as a monk.
This was a 1963 reconstruction of the voyage of St Columba in 563 AD from Northern Ireland to the island of Iona off the coast of NW Scotland, in a time when voyage reconstructions were rare. I was 13 and could only look on with envy. But it got me thinking. Maybe you too. I’ve gathered together information about the voyage and the curragh here. It’s quite a tale.
An update on the book, some background to Shetland boats, about our publisher, and how we kept accurate time on The Aegre.
The Aegre is one of the characters of this story, but I don’t attempt to humanise her. She was a Shetland boat and had enough character without any need to give her human frailties. I knew her intimately, every plank and fastening, and her behaviour in calms and storms. I learned to move with her as if we were extensions of each other. Intuitively I learnt to trust her.
But it was only after the voyage that I learned more about Shetland boats, their origins, and usage over centuries. I wasn’t surprised. Long before I’d learnt that with the sweetness of her lines, The Aegre could slip through the water with barely a ripple in the lightest of breezes, surge forward endlessly before the big sweeping swells of the trade winds, and slow down to ride out the big rollers when it all became a bit much.
So it was that gathering background material for this story, I discovered books about these boats, their building and their use in the Shetland Isles. You might be interested too.
Take a look at Adrian Osler’s ‘The Shetland Boat’ and ‘Shetland’s Boats: Origin, evolution and use’ by Marc Chivers. With Dr Adrian Osler’s permission, I’ve included some of his drawings of the construction of Shetland boats in The Aegre voyage book.
Another is ‘Small Boats of Shetland’, a delightful little book by Alison Munro. All are available from the Shetland Times Bookshop.
Small boat designer Iain Oughtred has created relatively easily built designs that draw heavily on Shetland boats, such as his 19’6″ Caledonia Yawl, the design of my last boat, Crazybird.
Book progress: The book is almost ready to go the printer. We are just finalising some pages; then it’ll be the grand final check before sending it off.
The book publisher: The Voyage of The Aegre, is being published by Vinycomb Press. Not (yet) a well-known publisher. Last year I was only able to interest one commercial publisher (other than the vanity press) but eventually, I realised that to tell the story in the way I wanted, regardless of the market, I needed to publish the book myself. Fortunately, by then, I had around me a rather expert team committed to the book’s success. We decided to publish it ourselves. But we were spread around the world.
The Vinycomb Press publishing team comprises:
Dr Gene Carl Feldman, kayaker and small boat sailor, NASA oceanographer and editorial adviser, with a curious link to The Aegre explained in the book. Lives near Washington, DC.
David Burnett, retired Gollancz publisher. Tireless, and with the wisdom of a long career in publishing. Knows everyone, based in Ludlow, UK.
Dr Digby James, Page Maker, fast, a church minister when he’s not page making. Lives in Oswestry, UK.
Sandra Bell, reader, and common sense adviser, taking on some marketing work, responds so quickly we call her Ping. Lives somewhere in the UK.
Myself, I write the stuff. Based in Melbourne, Australia.
And the name? It’s in honour of John Vinycomb, an engraver, illuminator, and heraldic designer, born in 1833. He published books such as ‘On the process for the production of ex-libris (book plates) (1894). He was my great-grandfather.
A photo of him working at his desk hangs on the wall beside me as I write. I’m going to create a page about some of his work on the website, but it’s not available yet.
This week on the book website, I’ve added a page about the difficulty of measuring accurate time aboard The Aegre, why it was important and how we eventually solved the problem. Our solution ended up saving our lives too. See Measuring time aboard The Aegre
Next week I’ll explain our plans to support the book with chapter notes on the website and give a glimpse of things to come.
Publishing update; the book cover outside and in; about Shetland boat drawings in the book; the South Australia Wooden Boat Festival; this week’s artifact from The Aegre voyage, and updates to the website.
The Voyage of The Aegre story is almost ready to go to the printer. That is to say Page maker Dr Digby James in Oswestry (UK) is putting the final touches to the layout. He’s part of our Vinycomb Press Editorial and Publishing team. It’s moderately complicated because apart from the text, we have a dozen maps, six drawings and eight pages of photos.
And then Publishing date is 27 July 2023 – 15 weeks away.
Finally the cover is done, designed by Gene Carl Feldman. He’s another member of our Vinycomb Press team. The ends of the cover fold in as a flap back and front.
And then on the reverse of the cover, the flaps open out to reveal maps of the course of The Aegre. In the front across the Atlantic, and across the Pacific in the back.
As a result we think it looks pretty special. Gene found these charts, in a Boston library. The Atlantic one is from 1797 and the Pacific one from 1849 (both long out of copyright). Aboard The Aegre, we were given and used several Pacific charts of about the same age as the one we’ve reproduced here. I still have some of them.
Later this month (29-30 April) I’ll be at the biennial South Australia Wooden Boat Festival at Goolwa at the mouth of the Murray River, a bit south of Adelaide.
I’ve been a few times before. It’s always an exotic mix of traditional wood-burning paddle steamers from up the river, vintage river sailing boats, putt-putts, and jazz bands. All together with delicious food and South Australian beers and wines. See https://www.sawoodenboatfestival.com.au/ Out on the water I’ve learnt NOT to get in the way of racing riverboat paddle steamers.
This week on the websiteabout The Aegre Voyage I’ve added another artifact I still have from the voyage. It’s a little Suunto hand-bearing compass. It’s very precious to me. Read why: https://nicholasgrainger.com.au/?page_id=839 I’ve also added a Media tab beneath which is PR stuff about the book. Included are a new Advance Information sheet, author bio, reviews, and details of how to get an advance copy of the book for review.
That’s all for this week. Next week I hope to be writing that the book is ready to go to print. It’s being published by Vinycomb Press and I’ll explain the torturous path to publication. In the artifact section of the website I’ll write about our difficulty with measuring accurate time aboard The Aegre, why it was important and how we eventually solved the problem.
If you have a request for a topic on The Aegre voyage that you’d like me to address in a post or any comment, please contact me. And as ever, please share this with a friend.
The Voyage of The Aegre – From Scotland to the South Seasin a Shetland boat will be published on 27 July 2023. and launched in Lerwick, Shetland, during the Tall Ships Festival 26-29 July 2023. I’ll be there to talk about the voyage, the book and answer questions.
Copies will be available in Lerwick, also from Amazon, Book Depository, Central Books, other online booksellers and progressively through bookstores in the UK, US, AU and NZ. I’ll send out details of how you can pre-order a bit nearer the time.
The book will be coming out as a paperback. It’s about 264 pages, with 8 pages of photographs. There are also more than a dozen maps in the book so you can follow along where we went and drawings of the rig, the interior layout of the boat and of the boat under sail. It will also be available as an ebook.
Added to the website this week is a new tab Reviews, kicking off with a review by sailing journalist and broadcaster Paul Heiney of the Royal Cruising Club, joining a review by 1966 Atlantic rower, adventurer and author John Ridgway.
Also new to the website is a piece under the Artifacts tab on plotting our position at sea on The Aegre. See https://nicholasgrainger.com.au/
I’ll be adding posts and more background information about the voyage and the book every week between now and July, so maybe bookmark the website and come back soon.
Keep your friends informed about the coming book by forwarding this email and encouraging them to subscribe on the website! Thank you.
This website is about the book The Voyage of The Aegre, a voyage from Scotland to the south seas in a Shetland boat.
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