A Mile Down: The True Story of a Disastrous Career at Sea - Hardcover

Vann, David

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0434021954 ISBN 13: 9780434021956

Publisher: William Heinemann Ltd, 2015

Synopsis

In this inspirational memoir, internationally bestselling author David Vann tells the true story of building his own sailing ship and of the disastrous voyage that ensues.

As a thirty-year-old tourist in Turkey, David Vann stumbles across the steel frame of a ninety-foot sailboat and decides to fulfill a long-buried dream: he will rebuild the boat. From friends, family, and credit cards, he borrows $150,000 to construct the ship and achieve his ambition.

However, when the Turkish builders take shameless advantage of him, eventually charging him over $500,000, Vann finds himself on the edge of financial ruin and decides to start a chartering business. Battling with construction nightmares, spiraling debts and freak storms, Vann begins to wonder if he is merely repeating his father’s failures at sea, and a career that led to tragedy.

At once a page-turning memoir of adventure on the open ocean and a tale of one man’s attempt to overcome fate and realise his dream, A Mile Down is an unforgettable story of struggle and redemption by a writer of rare power.

About this title

From the Inside Flap

A harrowing—and heartbreaking—true story of one ordinary man’s misadventures at sea

"A Mile Down would be a cautionary tale for anyone who dreams of the freedom of the high seas—if only it wasn’t so damn exciting. . . ." —STEWART O'NAN, coauthor with Stephen King of Faithful: Two Diehard Boston Red Sox Fans Chronicle the Historic 2004 Season and author of The Night Country

"At once memoir, confession, travel book, and thriller, David Vann’s A Mile Down is so vivid and intense you will dread to see it end. . . . The book is a testimony of passion and courage in deadly storms and scarier calms, of a man wrestling with his ghosts and gifts in the very shadow of paradise." —ROBERT MORGAN, author of Gap Creek

"A Mile Down is pure adrenaline. Vann by all rights should have died at sea, and yet he’s lived to tell about it. But the thrill comes also from other kinds of risk—risk of repeating his father’s suicide, risk of financial disaster, risk of prosecution, risk of losing everything including who he believes himself to be. This story won’t let you go." —MELANIE THERNSTROM, author of The Dead Girl and Halfway Heaven

"A Mile Down is far more than a tale of ruin at sea. It’s also a story of desire and shame, of the struggle to escape our histories and know our dreams. Vann writes that ‘A life can be like a work of art, constantly melted away and reshaped,’ and he shows us this reshaping, this rebirth of hope from despair and ruin, so powerfully I couldn’t put the book down. You have to read this book, even if you care nothing about sailing or the sea. Just read it." —LALITA TADEMY, author of Cane River

"A Mile Down is a riveting and truthful account of a good man’s attempt to stay afloat on treacherous waters. This book reminded me of Robert Stone’s 'Outerbridge Reach,' or John Casey’s 'Spartina,' but in many ways Vann’s odyssey is more unforgettable. The fact that Vann lived to tell it is an achievement in itself." —TOM BARBASH, author of On Top of the World: Cantor Fitzgerald, Howard Lutnick, & 9/11: A Story of Loss & Renewal

"A Mile Down is suberbly crafted. As in the great epics, the protagonist faces an unrelenting crush of disasters, bad luck, and ill will, yet picks himself up over and over to carry on. . . . David Vann has created a tale of hubris and endurance that is both exciting and beautifully written." —KEITH SCRIBNER, author of The Goodlife and Miracle Girl

"Riveting, heartbreaking, and redemptive . . . A Mile Down is a memoir as engaging as the most compelling of novels . . . This is an immensely moving and exciting book—it’s as if one of the heroes of A Perfect Storm had lived to write his memoirs." —JULIE HILDEN, author of 3 and The Bad Daughter

"A Mile Down is mandatory reading for anyone who’s ever flirted with thoughts of a life spent at sea." —A. MANETTE ANSAY, author of Vinegar Hill

About the Author

David Vann was born in the Aleutian Islands and spent his childhood in Ketchikan, Alaska. He is the author of the international bestseller Legend of a Suicide - which has been translated into eighteen languages and won several prizes including the Prix Medicis Etranger - Caribou Island, Dirt, Goat Mountain and Aquarium. He is also the author of two bestselling non-fiction books, and has written for Atlantic Monthly, Esquire, the Sunday Times, Guardian, Sunday Telegraph, Financial Times and other magazines and newspapers.

Edition details

• Publisher: William Heinemann Ltd
• Publication date: 2015
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0434021954
• ISBN 13: 9780434021956
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 256