thedailychannel.com — recommended books

The Brendan Voyage
by Tim Severin

My enthusiasm for this book is nearly boundless. In a quiet, relentless and dramatic way, Tim Severin tells the story of his attempt to retrace the seven-year voyage one St. Brendan may have taken from Ireland to Newfoundland, hundreds of years before the Vikings set sail.

Those poor Vikings. It seems that practically every island they landed on was already inhabited by Irish sea-faring monks.

In the summer of 2001 I had the great good fortune to see, entirely by accident, the oxhide boat which Tim Severin designed, built, and with four other sailors made the attempt to cross the North Atlantic. When I got the book in the little tourist-trap bookstore in Ireland, it hadn't really sunk in that...this was the boat.

As to their fate and the success of their attempt, well... that would be spoiling the story to tell you what happened, now wouldn't it?

Row on over to amazon.com and set sail on The Brendan Voyage.

reviewed October 14, 2001