In 2008 I wrote a short review on his first book, Voyages of a Simple sailor, and what a review it was. Roger has the most addictive writing style, and I found myself glued to it’s pages until I was finally left disappointed that I’d ran out of new ones.

The new book, Mingming & the Art of Minimal Ocean Sailing: More Voyages of a Simple Sailor, will hopefully deliver more of that great writing, and knowing what he’s been doing in Mingming over the last few years, I have no doubt he’s got one hell of a story to tell.

Just on the slim chance that you don’t already know about Mingming, she’s a junk rigged Corribee, fitted out specifically for single handed ocean going. Roger has covered many thousands of miles in that little boat, which is essentially Kudu with a different rig. I honestly can’t wait to read this!

The book is currently on pre-order at Amazon, but I will post a full review when I get my copy.

Click here to pre order it.

I’m quite surprised by the number of sailors I’ve encountered who haven’t even heard of Roger Taylor, or Ming Ming, his Corribee.

I promise you that this will be one of the best book purchases you will make this year.  The man is a master of the written word, a craftsman of language, and a bloody lunatic! A potent combination that will have you on the edge of your seat throughout. If you don’t agree by the time you get to the last page, then you have a truly inert sense of adventure indeed.

Sadly the last page comes all to soon, and thus pauses the epic tale of Mr Taylor.

Fortunately, he writes a monthly article on his website, and it always makes for entertaining reading.  I hadn’t checked for updates in a while, but I enjoyed reading the latest one this morning so much, that I thought it deserved sharing.

http://www.thesimplesailor.com/articles.html

I do believe that reason there have been no updates since June, is because he’s currently sailing to the Arctic, in a Corribee, similar to Kudu. Legend!

Voyages of a Simple Sailor click the image to buy now at Amazon.com

Who is Roger Taylor? I had no idea when I stumbled accross this book. The Queen drummer? Well sure yeah, that’s one Roger Taylor, but this Roger – Roger D Taylor – is somebody far, far more interesting.

I have to be honest here, I was expecting ‘Voyages Of A Simple Sailor’ to be mediocre account of some amatuer sailor with a half interesting story. I only bought the book because part of it is about his Corribee, and since I’d just bought one was interested to read about them.

It turns out I could not have been more wrong. After a couple of pages I felt I was in the company of a great writer. His style is absolutely captivating, so completely absorbing that you could be forgiven for wearing a life jacket whilst reading it in bed.

The book is split into four parts, each a story of it’s own, the first is about how Roger began his sailing career and how he found himself in New Zealand, it’s easy reading and makes a good warm up and gentle segway in to the most fascinating roller coaster of a tale that I’ve read for a long time.

The second part is about the Endevour 2, a square rigger that Roger went sailing on in his early twenties, in fact just a touch younger than I am now. It’s the most gripping of the three stories and he does stunning job of portraying the situation. I don’t want to give any of it away, but you’ll just have to trust me on this, it’s one hell of a good story.

The third part is about his little self built 19 foot Ferro Cement boat ‘Roc’, and how he sailed her across the Tasman sea from New Zealand to Australia in some absolutely horrific conditions. In fact, it was on that trip that he died – you’ll have to read it to undertand that bit

The final part is the reason I bought the book in the first place, the story of mingming, his 21ft Junk Rigged Corribee. This final part of the book is by no means poorly written, but I don’t think it’s quite as elegant as the former two parts. This is perhaps down to the fact that the story being told is not quite so full of peril and near loss of life, but nevertheless it’s by no means a chore to read.

Overall this book as been one of my favorite reads this year and I really do encourage anybody with that faint flame of adventure in their hearts to buy a copy and read in awe, or envy at what’s possible if you just put your mind into it (and of course, your backside on the line

Click here to buy ‘Voyages Of A Simple Sailor’ at Amazon.com