As this book is presented as an "adventure" book, that is the way I will judge it.
Anyone who has the courage to row across the Atlantic Ocean, the physical ability to carry it off, and the intelligence to plan the trip in such a manner that they are actually able to complete the trip has my admiration in their feat.
Many people have died in this attempt. In fact, during the particular race the author writes about, nearly a fourth of the competing boats sank and those rowers needed rescued. Fortunately, fatalities were prevented because of both luck and the support provided by the race organizers. This is an extreme "sport" that few would attempt and even fewer are able to accomplish. True, the author had several years of rowing experience, but nothing that really prepared her for the tremendous physical and emotional distances she had to deal with in rowing the Atlantic.
This is an engaging, well-written book (up to a point). However, as an adventure book, it does have its faults. For one, rowing the Atlantic Ocean alone has been done many times before, both by men and by women, so it has lost its "firstness" factor. For example, nearly everyone remembers who was the first to fly the Atlantic alone, but few would remember the second or the third or the sixth to do so. Most people would even remember the words spoken by the first man to set foot on the moon, but does anyone remember what the second man said? In "Rowing the Atlantic", there is simply no suspense in whether rowing across the Atlantic Ocean alone can be done. We know it can be done; it has been done. We just don't know whether or not author will be able to do it.
Secondly, the trip isn't terribly eventful. Yes, the author's cook stove quits working so she has only cold food, she has problems with her oars, but she is never left without working oars, and she loses her telephone service near the end of the trip. Also, the weather was bad at times and she is physically drained, but there is nothing here that really made this particular trip any more adventuresome than many others that have gone on before--or that have been written about before. Obviously, these troublesome situations are much more eventful to the person on the boat; but to the reader, unless they are new to adventure books, this is not really a suspenseful trip. In fact, I thought the part of the book that dealt with the author quitting her job, training for the trip and getting her boat ready was the bigger adventure of the book.
Also, while I salute the author for changing her life and "finding herself," I found it ridiculous that she blames her infidelity to her husband (and later her divorce) to her desire to find out who she really was. Imagine a man saying, "Yes, I cheated on my wife because I was trying to find myself." By the way, the author made a point of bringing this up in the book; I am just stating my opinion on it. So when the author speaks of an "unraveling marriage," it certainly appears that a great deal of the unraveling was of her own undoing. Also, at the end of the book when her now ex-husband shows up to support her, she claims that she still loves him but she has moved on. Imagine, again, a man saying this about his wife, "I love her, but I have moved on." The author should realize that how you treat people on your quest to find yourself is just as important, if not more so, than actually finding out whom "you really are" (whatever that means).
In the end, I would rate the first half of this book as a four. It is well-written, it moves along quickly, it was interesting to learn what lead the author to change her life around, and it was engaging to see whether she was going to be able to carry off her adventure. But by about half-way through, I felt the book to be losing its momentum, because the adventure seemed to be over and all that was left was to reach land. While this is a reasonably decent book, it is not anywhere near the adventure that books such as "The Long Walk", "Adrift", "Carrying the Fire", "Endurance", "Travels in West Africa", "Alone", "Alive", "Man Eaters", "Running the Amazon" or similar books rate. It is these books that rate as four or five star books to me, so I can not rate "Rowing the Atlantic" as a five star book.
Overall all then, I give the book a three star rating because it is just an average adventure book. It is a well-written book and it is enjoyable to read, but it is just average. Anyone who quits their job and rows a boat across the Atlantic Ocean deserves a five star rating for having the spunk to attempt the feat, but that doesn't make the book a great book. What I am saying with my comparisons to other adventure books is that while this is an entertaining book to read, it will never make the list of the top 50 adventure books of all time. And since it is advertised as an adventure book, that is the way I am going to rate it.
